On 1 June Andrei Tverdokhlebov was taken to his place of exile, the settlement of Nyurbachan in Yakutia, and there released by his escorts. So the end of Tverdokhlebov’s ‘term’ will be in the second half of January 1978.
It is 15 kilometres from Nyurbachan to the district centre of Nyurba. Aeroplanes from Yakutsk and Mirny fly to Nyurba. Tverdokhlebov’s postal address is: 678266, Yakut ASSR, settlement Nyurbachan, 1 Pushkin Street. Tverdokhlebov is employed as a worker in a sawmill.
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On 26 June Tverdokhlebov’s brother-in-law Alexander Shuster set off to spend his holiday visiting him. While waiting in Mirny for a flight to Nyurba, Shuster stopped at a hotel. The aeroplane to Nyurba was due to take off early in the morning of 27 June. At 2 or 3 am the other occupant of Shuster’s room and a friend of the latter’s who had come to visit him, offered to drive Shuster to the airport. However, the private car which they rented from the hotel drove off in the opposite direction to the airport and stopped at the police station.
Policemen with handcuffs came out of the police station and headed for the ’room-mate’s friend’ (it later turned out that this was Guliyev, chairman of the All-Union Volunteer Organization in Support of the Army, Air Force and Navy in the town of Chernyshevsk). He started a fight with the police. He was dragged out of the car and taken into the police station; Shuster and his ‘room-mate’ were also asked to come inside. Guliyev and Shuster were locked in cells. Shuster’s ‘room-mate’ disappeared and Shuster did not see him again. In the afternoon of 27 June Shuster was taken to a court and sentenced to 15 days under the Decree of Petty Hooliganism. The police, when asked what he was ‘guilty’ of, gave different replies to different people: insulting behaviour to the police, resisting the police, taking part in an affray. For the first five days after being sentenced, Shuster went on hunger-strike. He was released on the evening of 11 July. (Guliyev was fined by a judge for his participation in the same ‘incident’.)
On 9 July Tverdokhlebov was taken off work at the sawmill and sent, almost by force, to take part in hay-mowing 20 kilometres from Nyurbachan (on that day Tverdokhlebov’s mother and stepfather were flying to Mirny). When he discovered that there was to be no hay-mowing activity because of weather conditions, Tverdokhlebov returned to Nyurbachan on foot. On 11 July (a Sunday) the police drove up from Nyurba, dragged Tverdokhlebov (alone!) out of a local wedding and declared him to be slightly drunk. On 12 July Tverdokhlebov was again sent off to mow hay. Because, as before, there was no hay-mowing going on, Tverdokhlebov returned once more to Nyurbachan.
On 15 July he finally met his relatives.
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A Chronicle of Current Events 