Armenian Activist Surfaces in Ethiopia; Coming to L.A.

An Armenian activist said today that he was forced to fly to Ethiopia under KGB guard after his expulsion from the Soviet Union, but he won a promise after a hunger strike that his family could join him in exile in the West.

Paruyr Ayrikyan told the Associated Press by telephone from Addis Ababa that he is being cared for by the local Armenian community and has been assured refuge in the United States for himself and nine family members.

The 39-year-old activist, who played a prominent role in a recent struggle between Armenians and Azerbaijanis for control of the Nagorno-Karabakh region, said he has not seen or spoken to his wife since his March 25 arrest.

Ayrikyan said that he will never abandon efforts to return to his native Armenia but that he wants his family with him in exile.

Plan to Settle in L.A.

He said he has been told by U.S. and Ethiopian authorities that he will be able to leave Addis Ababa in a few days and will stay with relatives in France until his family can join him. They plan to settle in Los Angeles, where they have other relatives that they have never met, he said.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Charles E. Redman said that Ayrikyan’s wife and family in Moscow also requested resettlement in the United States and that the U.S. Embassy in Moscow is processing them as refugees.

Ayrikyan, who had served 17 years in Soviet prisons and labor camps before his release last year after a government review of political sentencings, was expelled from the Soviet Union last week. His expulsion followed the Kremlin’s rejection of an appeal by Armenians for annexation of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region in the Caucasus Mountains.

He is believed to be the first Soviet dissident expelled to the Kremlin’s African ally. The unusual action may indicate Soviet concern about how their traditional allies in Eastern Europe would respond if asked to take part in a punitive measure against a dissident.

Jailed Since March 25

Western nations, including the United States, had refused to accept the nationalist because he was being expelled by Soviet authorities against his will.

He had been jailed in the Armenian capital of Yerevan since March 25 on charges of slandering the Soviet state. The accusations stemmed from his reports to Western journalists on the Armenian campaign for control of Nagorno-Karabakh.

His family had been allowed no contact with him since his arrest and did not know his whereabouts until late Tuesday when he telephoned his mother-in-law, Nina Sidorenko, from Ethiopia.

Ayrikyan said he had gone on a hunger strike when authorities informed him that he was being expelled, and he abandoned it Tuesday when Soviet diplomats in Addis Ababa told U.S. envoys that his family will be allowed to join him.