RUSSIA: Trouble in the Sticks

The rulers of Russia did their best last week to trample out flickering embers of independence in four more "Soviet Republics" embedded in the Communist Empire. Police Chief Lavrenty Beria's purgers "reorganized" and "consolidated" the government of 1) the Baltic Republic of Latvia, enslaved by the Red army in 1940, lost, and recaptured in 1944; 2) the Moldavian Soviet Republic, part of which was snatched from Rumania; 3) the Caucasian Mountain Republic of Armenia; 4) Azerbaijan, which hugs the Caspian Sea near the northern border of Iran. In all four "republics" the pattern was the same; a drastic tightening...

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