TOP SECRET IN MOSCOW -
Despite the liberalization measures’ conceded by Khrushchev . and his heirs as conciliatory gestures to Soviet citizens who would like an end to bureaucratic practices and the restoration of .proletarian democracy, the atmosphere in the Soviet: Union remains stifling. Just how stifling. it is can be judged: from an anecdote told by Vladimirovich Finkelstein, editor of the scientific magazine Knowledge Strength and a regular writer for Pravda and the Literary Gazette, who recently defected in London and asked the British authorities for asylum.
As reported by René Bhglish, special correspondent of the New York Posty ‘September 20:. | :
“The. aspect of Soviet life that drove him to get out was the all-pervading censorship in Russia. Its repressiveness. Itsillogicality carried to the point of madness. You want an example? Finkelstein has it. Taking a page proof of his scientific magazine to a woman censor, he reported that the officer sat up with a bolt when she saw a. diagram giving the diameter of the earth.
"'You'll have to strike that figure out.'
"Why? Has this now become secret too?"
'"'¥es, there is a directive -- not to > publish the exact size of the planet. wn