Word: kurashvili
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Dates: during 1972-1972
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...Kurashvili came to the State Department's attention two weeks ago, when he and a fellow Soviet student, Grigory Smelyi, were arrested for allegedly shoplifting from a Berkeley market. After the State Department intervened, the charges were dropped and the men were allowed to remain at Berkeley. Soviet authorities apparently felt that the incident reflected poorly on their country. The two students were flown to the Soviet embassy in Washington, then taken to Kennedy Airport in a minibus by several embassy staffers. During the drive, Kurashvili slashed his neck and wrists with a razor blade; he was bleeding heavily...
...dour Russian diplomats hustled their charge through Kennedy Airport, they were met by a determined contingent of U.S. State Department and immigration officials. Their friend, the Russians assured the Americans, did not want asylum and had chosen to return home; but, no, he could not confirm this personally. Merab Kurashvili, 36, an engineering teacher doing postgraduate work at the University of California at Berkeley, stood nervously watching, his throat and wrists bandaged. Without an interview, the Americans replied, Kurashvili would not be permitted to board a waiting Aeroflot jet. The Soviets yielded-perhaps in part because the U.S., by coincidence...
...demanded new guidelines to ensure against a similar occurrence. The resultant recodification authorizes, among other things, "the use of force against attempts at forcible repatriation," and provides for quicker communication between the State Department and various federal, state and local agencies likely to encounter defectors. The mystery surrounding Kurashvili allowed for the immediate practical application of the new guidelines...
Confrontation. Airport authorities meanwhile relayed the details to the State Department's Operations Center, now the clearinghouse for handling any such incident. A department official was dispatched to the hospital. When he arrived, Kurashvili had already been moved to the Soviet Mission to the U.N. in Manhattan. U.S. officials scheduled a hearing for Kurashvili to make sure that he actually wanted to return to the U.S.S.R. He failed to appear, supposedly because he was too ill. The airport confrontation ensued...
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