House of the dead
Sir: May I make a late comment on Tibor Szamuely's point (14 July) that the western liberal conscience is highly selective? This is my experience in trying to raise instances of terrible treatment of people in Iron Curtain countries, who are not well known writers or artists.
Take, for example, the case of whole groups of monks from the monastery of the Ascension of Our Lady at Potsjaef, Ukraine, who are being deported, imprisoned and beaten by the state security officials so that the monastery can be closed, and of pil- grims who are threatened with imprisonment as vagrants. One monk, Grigorios, has died in prison. Another old monk, Wassily, has been sentenced to two years' imprisonment. The number of monks has been so far reduced from 146 to thirty-six.
With perhaps more courage than realism, the monks of Potsjaef have written to the Soviet authorities. Needless to say this has not helped them. In my experience they would have had exactly the same non-reaction if they had written to some of our Establishment newspapers. They would have been edged out by Greece and the sonic booms.
If anyone doubts Mr Szamuely's point on the selective liberal conscience, may I suggest he carries
out an experiment by writing a series of letters to newspapers on (a) lack of freedom in South Africa and Greece, (b) ditto in Iron Curtain countries.
Michael Ivens 13 Wessex Gardens, London NWI I
Previous page
