Underground Soviet editor gets top slander sentence

Valery Abramkin, editor of the underground journal Poiski (Searches), was sentenced to three years in prison after being convicted of anti-Soviet slander, his wife said. The sentence passed was the maximum for the offence. Mrs. Abramkin said her husband alleged that the judge, prosecutor, and prosecution witnesses had violated laws of procedure, and refused to answer questions put by the court after his objections were overruled. Another Poiski editor, Viktor Sokirko, was given a three-year suspended sentence last week after pleading guilty to anti-Soviet slander.