Armenian Dissident Loses Rights; Ouster Is Ordered

The Soviet government stripped a prominent Armenian nationalist of his citizenship Wednesday and ordered his expulsion from the country in a show of determination to end the unrest that has shaken the southern republics of Armenia and Azerbaijan for the past six months.

The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, the country’s Parliament, accused Paruir Airikyan, 39, of “harming the prestige of the Soviet Union” by helping stir up nationalist sentiment in strife-torn Armenia and helping create the prolonged crisis there.

Under the terms of the government’s decree, Airikyan will not be prosecuted--he has been held for four months on charges of instigating inter-ethnic hostility, a crime here--but will be sent into exile.

Dissident sources said Soviet officials had asked the U.S. Embassy about a week ago whether Airikyan would be admitted to the United States. The sources said they were advised informally that he would be accepted as a political refugee, although U.S. officials did not want to appear to be cooperating in Moscow’s expulsion of a leading dissident.

Tass, the official Soviet news agency, did not say in its report whether Airikyan--who had become one of the country’s most prominent dissidents in more than 20 years of political activity--had left the country or where he might go. Before his arrest in March, Tass said, Airikyan had been jailed twice on charges of anti-Soviet activity and once on a charge of bribing a government official. He was freed last year under an amnesty for political prisoners.

Expulsion has been used by the Kremlin in recent years to punish dissidents without jailing them and thus making them martyrs at home to their cause and symbols abroad of continuing political repression. Earlier this year, two Estonian dissidents were stripped of their citizenship and flown to Sweden with their families.

Strikes, Rallies

Airikyan, who has long advocated self-determination for Armenia, was a leader of the Karabakh Committee, which has led a campaign to transfer the mountainous region of Nagorno-Karabakh, a largely Armenian enclave in Azerbaijan, to neighboring Armenia.

The highly emotional issue has heightened nationalist feelings in Armenia, which has been largely paralyzed for the past month with repeated general strikes and rallies that have brought out as many as 500,000 people in Yerevan, the capital.

On Monday, the Supreme Soviet heard the Armenians argue passionately for the territory’s incorporation into Armenia or, as a compromise, its administration by the central government. The Supreme Soviet ruled that the region would remain a part of Azerbaijan but would have increased political, economic and cultural autonomy.

The government also ordered an immediate end to the strikes and mass protests in Armenia and in Nagorno-Karabakh and warned of stern measures to restore order.

Alexander V. Vlasov, the Soviet interior minister, described the situation in Armenia and Azerbaijan as still very tense. He said that small arms, knives, gasoline bombs and other weapons were being confiscated by police officers and soldiers there.

Vlasov, speaking on Soviet television, said the government has firm evidence that “extremist elements” are trying to provoke a confrontation between the authorities and the Armenian people and to escalate the conflict.

“Of course, we feel pressure to restore order,” he said, referring to widespread demands in other parts of the country, particularly from critics of the recent political liberalization. “I realize that there are some people who demand arrests, but I don’t think this is the best method. We must act using political methods, first of all, and within the framework of the law. Naturally, we must ensure order, and we act wherever resolute actions are required.”