su-bboards
More fuel for the flames.
n071  1525  16 May 84
BC-OLYMPIC(COX)
Soviets Sought Secret 'No Defections' Pledge
(Exclusive)
By ANDREW J. GLASS
c. 1984 Cox News Service
    WASHINGTON - The Soviet Union had sought secret assurances from the
Reagan administration that it would return to Soviet custody any of
their athletes who sought to defect during the Summer Olympic Games
in Los Angeles.
    The Soviet request was forwarded to President Reagan in late April,
while he was in China, where it was promptly rejected as morally and
politically objectionable.
    Sources familiar with the Soviet position did not assert that a ''no
defectors'' pledge of the sort which Moscow had raised in discussions
with senior U.S. officials would have guaranteed Soviet participation
in the Games. But they suggested that it could have been a critical
factor, given the deeply seated concerns voiced in Moscow over
prospective security arrangements.
    The sources said that shortly before the Soviet Olympic pullout was
announced on May 8, a carefully drafted letter was approved for the
president's signature that was aimed at reassuring the Soviets. The
White House plan called for the letter to be delivered to Soviet
President Konstantin Chernenko by Juan Antonio Samaranch, a Spanish
envoy who heads the International Olympic Committee.
    The essence of that letter, however, had already been conveyed to
senior Soviet diplomats in Washington on April 27 by Edward J.
Derwinski, a former Illinois congressmen who is coordinating Olympic
matters for the State Department.
    In his letter, Reagan vowed that the United States ''is totally
committed to upholding the (Olympic) charter and fulfilling its
responsibilities as the host nation of the Games.''
    Derwinski also handed Victor F. Isakov, a Soviet diplomat, a
detailed memorandum, which stated that anti-Soviet emigre groups
would be barred from staging demonstrations near the Olympic villages
housing the athletes or at the competition sites. This pledge, in
effect, met what had been another major demand which had been raised
by the Soviets.
    Soviet Olympic athletes and coaches had planned to live on a Russian
ship anchored off Long Beach during the Games. The White House had
waived several procedural rules, including maritime safety
regulations, to enable the Soviets to adopt this arrangement.
    Despite all these and other concessions, including unlimited landing
rights for charter flights by Aeroflot, the Soviet state airline,
Moscow further pressed the Reagan administration to make a secret
promise that defectors would be returned.
    It was further suggested that such a pledge would be self-limiting,
in that potential defectors would not dare to seek asylum - knowing
they would be handed over to the KGB, the Soviet state security
apparatus. Thus, it was argued, neither Reagan nor Chernenko need
ever have been embarrassed by the proposed arrangement.
    Before the May 8 pullout, sources said, top American officials fully
understood the Soviet fears of being humiliated through
demonstrations and defections at the July Games. Accordingly, they
advised Reagan to take a conciliatory tone without, however,
acquiesing to the complete list of Soviet demands. The president,
these sources said, ultimately adopted that course.
    U.S. officials had noted privately to their Soviet counterparts that
no Soviet athlete had ever defected during any post-war Olympiad in
which the Soviet Union had participated. But officials said the
Soviets seemed obsessed with the defection issue and made it the
standard by which they intended to judge Reagan's repeated private
assurances that the United States had no desire to seek any political
advantages from hosting the Games.
    This view was underscored by F. Don Miller, the executive director
of the U.S. Olympic Committee. ''What (the Soviets) really want(ed)
is a promise to hand over defectors,'' he said.
    The Soviet defector issue has been a sensitive one for U.S.
administrations ever since 1970 when a would-be Lithuanian defector,
Simas Kurdirka, was returned to his Soviet fishing vessel off Cape
Cod by the Coast Guard. Kudirka was subsequently granted asylum in
the United States after being held for several years in a Soviet
prison camp.
    
    (Distributed by The New York Times News Service)
    
nyt-05-16-84 1823edt
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