Soviets Protest U.S. Expulsion of Envoy as Spy

The Soviets today protested the U.S. expulsion of one of their diplomats and claimed that he was arrested while taking out the garbage at his home, not while receiving secret papers.

“Obviously, the long-awaited thaw in relations between the superpowers doesn’t suit everyone in the U.S.A.,” Tass press agency said in a long dispatch today.

It called the expulsion of Lt. Col. Yuri N. Pakhtusov a “provocative action.” There was no immediate word, however, on any Soviet retaliation.

Pakhtusov, a military attache at the Soviet Embassy in Washington, was ordered to leave the United States on Thursday after a six-month FBI investigation culminated in his arrest Wednesday night.

Sensitive Data

A U.S. source identified the 35-year-old Soviet as a member of GRU, the Soviet military’s intelligence arm.

U.S. officials said he was ordered home after the FBI caught him receiving sensitive information on how the U.S. government protects computer secrets.

Tass mocked those charges and expressed outrage at the FBI’s treatment of Pakhtusov after the arrest outside his Virginia home.

“FBI agents seized Pakhtusov late Wednesday evening, when, before going to sleep, he left his apartment to put garbage in the garbage chute. He went out in house slippers, sweat pants and a T-shirt,” Tass said. “You’ll agree that people don’t go out into the cold to receive secret documents dressed like that.”

Refused to Defect

Tass said the FBI agents handcuffed Pakhtusov and put him in a car. The agency said that they offered him money to defect but that the diplomat refused.

It also said that he was not allowed to return to his apartment to tell his wife what had happened or to dress in warmer clothes and that he was not allowed to call the Soviet Embassy right away.

“Even a murderer in the U.S.A. is given the right when arrested to make one telephone call,” Tass said.

The news agency said it is sad that the arrest came at a time when more Americans are developing “sympathetic and unconcealed interest” in the Soviet Union.

It said, however, that some Americans are able to “benefit by portraying Soviet diplomats as spies and supplying nonexistent proof.”