Four Homesick Emigres Decide to Return to the Soviet Union; Unchallenging U.S. Jobs Cited

The Soviet Embassy, in a rare press conference, Friday put on display four Soviet emigres who said they have decided to go home after spending about a decade each in the United States because, as one put it, “here in the West I became an orthodox adherent of Marxism-Leninism.”

All four, previously unknown except to family and neighbors, said they had become homesick after working at what they considered unchallenging jobs in the United States. But all four said they would take with them fond memories of the Americans they had come to know.

The press conference was held in the midst of a concerted Soviet effort to put the best face on its human rights record after the Iceland summit meeting between President Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

Wanted to Tell Stories

But Soviet Consul General Vladimir A. Kuleshov, when asked what message Moscow hoped to convey, said the embassy called the press conference simply because the four individuals wanted to tell their stories.

The four included two Jews, Israel Glickman, 61, and Yuri Chapovsky, 27, who left the Soviet Union in 1974 and 1978, respectively, on visas authorizing them to go to Israel. But both came directly to the United States.

The other two were Rashid Atamalibikov, 54, who said he is an atheist despite his Muslim name, and Alexander Belikim, 41, a 1977 emigre.

Atamalibikov, who said he left the Soviet Union in 1978 after a “kind of scandal” touching his job as a motion picture cameraman, said he came to miss “Russian culture” while working at a variety of jobs in the Jersey City, N.J., area, and also became an ardent Marxist.

Now Misses His Wife

“I was brought up on Dostoevski and Chekhov, great writers, and now I think it is more appropriate that I work there,” he said, speaking through an interpreter. He also said he missed his wife, though he conceded that he had not wanted her to accompany him to the United States eight years ago.

Chapovsky, who earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Georgia Tech but said he had difficulty finding a job before he landed a teaching position at the Art Institute of Atlanta, said he decided that words like freedom and democracy did not “match the deeds” of society in the United States.

“Everybody here is free--that’s nice, and everybody knows that,” said Chapovsky, the only one of the four who trusted his English to answer questions without using a translator. “But you are attached to the place you have a job. You have to eat, so that limits your freedom considerably. In the Soviet Union, everybody is provided with a job, so you can do whatever you want in your spare time.”

Family ‘Reacted Badly’

Chapovsky, who said he is an atheist although his family is Jewish, said he is leaving his mother, father and brother behind in the United States. He said they “reacted very badly” to his decision to return to the Soviet Union because “they like it here.”

Consul General Kuleshov said that “more than 1,000” Soviet citizens living in the United States have sought permission to return home. He said that this is a complex process and that permission is not automatic but that it had been granted for these four applicants.

When asked how many Soviet citizens have been allowed to return this year, Kuleshov said he did not know. He also said he does not know how many former residents of the Soviet Union are living in the United States.