The case of Vytautas Skuodis
THE CASE OF VYTAUTAS SKUODIS, US. CITIZEN ON AUGST 18, 1981 there was a procession in Chicago calling public attention to the plight of Benedict Scott (.Vytautas Skuodis) who had been arrested for...
...1979 for "amoral conduct" and, through information provided by Andrei Sakharov, it was learned that he was arrested January 9, 1980...
...1979, he joined the Lithuanian Helsinki Watch Group...
...1979...
...Latvia, and Siberia...
...Senator Charles Percy, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has sponsored a Senate resolution, No...
...government's treatment of his case may provide some indication as to how well the Reagan administration's policy of "quiet diplomacy" will work in contending with human rights violations...
...CITIZEN ON AUGST 18, 1981 there was a procession in Chicago calling public attention to the plight of Benedict Scott (.Vytautas Skuodis) who had been arrested for "anti-Soviet activities" by the KGB Scott was born in the Windy City April 21...
...a tape recorder, and samizdat publications...
...198, urging the State Department to exert pressure on Scott's behalf with Soviet authorities...
...Because of his accomplishments, he was men-tinned in a Soviet encyclopedia and in 1969 was offered a post at his old school...
...On November 24...
...Scon's plight is noteworthy because the U.S...
...representatives to confer with him and provide legal counsel...
...Scott did not get invoked in protest activities until he reached middle age In 1953 he graduated from the Univcisity of Vilnius with a degree in engineering and for sixteen vejrs worked on hydroelectn-cal and geological projects in Lithuania...
...Sometime during the next ten years he reaffirmed his Catholic faith and began writing a book protesting lehgious persecution in Lithuania...
...Die August 18 procession in Chicago -three thousand strong -proceeded from the home of his birth to the church where he was baptized, Our Lady of Vilnius Spokesmen for the marchers asserted that mere is no justification under the Soviet Constitution for his'arrest, and the USSR has violated international law by not allowing U.S...
...Spiritual Genutide in Lithuania, along with notes, two typewriters...
...1929...
...hut, in spite ot inquiries on his behalf by the Stale Department and several members of Congress, the Soviets have not allowed U.S officials to consult with him as is cuslom-ary when an American is arrested in a foreign country In contrast to Sakalys...
...but a year later returned with his parents to Lithuania, which was then an independent country...
...RICHARD j. krickusickus...
...Me was denied legal counsel at his trial, hut was sentenced in December 1980 to seven years of hard labor and five years of internal exile...
...KGB agents searched his home and confiscated a three-hundred-page manuscript...
...He was dismissed from the University of Vilnius on December 31...
...and the land of my forebears, Lithuania " On November 29...
...He never renounced his citizenship...
...Not to be intimidated, he offered his services to the Catholic Committee for the Defense of the Rights of Believers and wrote President Carter stating that he would "always remain faithful to the principles of the Defen.sc of Human Rights" and defend "the honor of the land of my birth, the U.S.A...
Vol. 108 • September 1981 • No. 17
