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- <text id=89TT0894>
- <title>
- Apr. 03, 1989: World Notes:Soviet Union
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1989
- Apr. 03, 1989 The College Trap
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- WORLD, Page 35
- World Notes
- SOVIET UNION
- Revolt of the Scientists
- </hdr><body>
- <p> When 1,279 scientists gathered at the prestigious Soviet
- Academy of Sciences last week to select delegates to the new
- Soviet parliament, nobody expected them to be happy. The
- procedure by which their slate of candidates was chosen had been
- widely criticized as both undemocratic and politically biased.
- In a series of "pre-electoral" meetings, the academy's ruling
- presidium had narrowed a list of 121 nominees to 23, eliminating
- such proponents for reform as space scientist Roald Sagdeyev and
- human-rights activist Andrei Sakharov.
- </p>
- <p> But nobody expected the academics to stage a full-scale
- revolt. After a noisy protest meeting outside, rank-and-file
- scientists voted to reject all but eight of the official
- candidates, leaving 15 vacancies in the 23 parliamentary seats
- set aside for scientists and clearing the way for the election
- of Sakharov and other reformers in a fresh round of voting next
- month. "This was the result of a great grass-roots movement,"
- an obviously pleased Sakharov told reporters at the gathering.
- "If they choose me to be a candidate and a Deputy, I will not
- refuse."
- </p>
-
- </body></article>
- </text>
-
-