News In Brief
| Geneva
Soviet report of rights actions is criticized before UN panel
An official Soviet human rights report was bitterly criticized Wednesday by four dissident emigres in a statement to the United Nations Human Rights Committee.
The Soviet report, submitted earlier this year, details alleged measures taken by the Soviet government over five years in compliance with a 1976 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Western observers to a three-week session of the UN panel, nearing its end, called the report a whitewash of the Soviet human rights situation.
A six-member Soviet delegation will answer questions from the UN committee today. Key areas of interest to the committee are the conditions in Soviet prisons and labor camps, practices in psychiatric clinics, and the treatment of religious groups.
