When politics enters in, legality goes out the window
The wheels of Soviet justice ground on grimly last week. Three just-convicted dissidents, Anatoli Shcharansky, Vik-toras Petkus and Alexander Ginzburg, began prison terms of 13, ten and eight years. At the same time, in a clumsy effort at press intimidation, a Moscow court ordered two American newsmen and their papers to pay fines and print retractions for having libeled state television employees. Meanwhile, other trials were in prospect, as Moscow continued its crackdown on domestic opposition.
Among other things, the trials focused new attention on...