New U.S. Rules Make Soviet Immigration More Difficult

The United States, overwhelmed by a dramatic surge in the number of Soviet citizens permitted by their government to emigrate, has changed its rules so that Soviets will face far more difficulty in being allowed to settle in America, a senior U.S. official told reporters here Wednesday.

The new rules, which take effect Monday, not only close the door to some would-be immigrants but also reflect a significant change in the way the United States views the issue of Soviet emigration.

Previously, U.S. officials, citing human rights violations, protested regularly that Moscow should give exit visas to all who wished to go, and virtually every Soviet citizen who received permission from his government to leave was welcomed into the United States.

Now that Moscow has opened its doors much wider, permitting about 300,000 Soviet citizens to seek U.S. immigration visas in the year that will end Sept. 30, the United States is forced into the uncomfortable role of setting limits.

“We’re in a bit of a moral quandary,” a top-ranking U.S. official in Moscow said. “We insisted for years that all Soviets who wanted to should be allowed to go to the United States. Now we’re the ones telling them no.”

The regulations, under which 70,000 to 80,000 Soviet citizens are expected to be allowed to emigrate to the United States in the next fiscal year, require in the majority of cases that new immigrants have either parents, children, brothers, sisters or spouses living in the United States, the official said.

According to a U.S. government leaflet being distributed to Soviets in Moscow, U.S. immigration officials will make exceptions in cases “of special concern to the United States,” but those with no close family ties “will face long delays, and may wish to explore alternative destinations.”

The new regulations are likely to please Israel, because they will eliminate the so-called “dropout phenomenon.” This involves Soviet Jews who have been granted visas to Israel but who, once in a third country, usually Austria or Italy, then seek and receive U.S. visas.

As of Monday, the U.S. official said, Soviet citizens sent to third countries on their way to Israel will no longer be granted visas to the United States.

Eagleburger Testimony

The announcement underscored recent testimony in Washington by Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence S. Eagleburger.

Calling the increase in emigration “a great success for our American foreign policy,” Eagleburger, nevertheless, said that the practice of granting visas in third countries posed an insoluble and overwhelming problem with the rapidly rising tide of applicants.

“While we applaud these developments, we must be honest in appraising our national ability to respond to unprecedented, unpredictable and previously unmanaged flows of people,” he told the Senate’s Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on immigration and refugee affairs Sept. 15.

Jewish organizations in the United States supported the changes as constructive efforts to deal with the unprecedented surge of emigrants.

Malcolm Hoenlein, the executive director of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in New York, called the new policy “a thoughtful approach.”

Soviet Jews seeking to emigrate to the United States, as well as victims of more recent persecutions such as Christian Armenians living in areas under the control of Muslim Azerbaijanis, fear that their chances may be worsened by the new rules.

Soviet citizens who gather daily outside the U.S. Embassy in Moscow seeking a visa to emigrate said Wednesday that they were confused about the new rules and concerned about how they would be affected.

The U.S. official, who talked with reporters with the understanding that he would not be further identified, said the United States is simply trying to treat the Soviet Union like any other country, and added, “This is the way refugee business is done all over the world.”

He said U.S. officials interviewing would-be immigrants will be taking greater care to differentiate between victims of persecution and discrimination.

Under the new rules, applicants will pick up questionnaires in Moscow, fill them out and send them to Washington, where immigration officials will study them and, within three or four months, notify those they find to be acceptable candidates for immigration.

The candidates will receive in the mail a letter notifying them of a time for an appointment with U.S. officials in the embassy in Moscow.

Those who have close relatives living in the United States and are found by the Moscow interviewer to be victims of persecution will be granted refugee status. This carries with it about $7,000 each in resettlement aid, the official said.

Those with close relatives living in the United States who are not victims of persecution, but are selected by Washington, will be allowed to enter the country as “parolees,” without official status but with permission to live and work there.

Times staff writer Michael J. Ybarra, in Washington, contributed to this report.