CIA-RDP96-00787R000200080015-8

Approved For Release 2001/03/26 : CIA-RDP96-00787R000200080015-8
Soviets Say U.S. Reporter Was Spy
From News Dispatches
correct" in their behavior and re-
MOSCOW, July 12-The Soviet Un-" turned the camera and film, but he
ion today accused a former American - added that "this is an indication of
newsman here, Robert C. Toth, of hav-
the difficulties of doing television in
the Soviet Union, even on an innocu-
ous subject."
ing worked for U.S. intelligence agen-
cies and said that it was only due to
the "good will and restraint" of Soviet
"authorities that criminal proceedings
were not lodged against him.
The accusation came in a lengthy
commentary distributed by the of-
ficial Soviet news agency, Tass. It
came a month after Toth, former Mos-
cow bureau chief of the Los Angeles
Times, was seized by the KGB secu-
rity police on a downtown street and
hauled away for the first session of a
total of 14 hours of questioning
¿spread over six days.
wix In another incident involving an
NAme can journalist today, CBS corre-
spo
:it Bernard C. Redmont and his
West German cameraman were
& roughed up while filming a Moscow
beer garden and then questioned by
police.
Redmont said he and cameraman
Kurt Hoefle had been filming for
about an hour when two unidentified
hemen suddenly tried to rip the camera
Laway, kicking Hoefle.
Uniformed and plainclothed police
joibroke up the melee and took the CBS
„men ito a police station where they
uwere questioned for about an hour.
Redmont said the police were "quite .
Toth, who was permitted to leave
the Soviet Union, on June 17, at the
scheduled end of his assignment, was
first accused of collecting "secret in-
formation of a political and military
character." Later, he was told he was
being questioned as a "witness," pre-
sumably against Anatoly Scharansky,
29, a computer expert and prominent
Soviet dissident who had been under
arrest since March 16, reportedly on a
treason charge.
Today's Tass article broadened the
attack against Toth, saying that he:
had "received . assignments not so
much from the Los Angeles Times as
from American special' agencies ..
While fulfilling these assignments,.
Toth tried to make the acquaintance
of Soviet, scientists who he thought
could possess information of interest
to U.S. special agencies."
Toth has denied collecting any se-
eret information during his three-year
`Moscow assignment and the U.S. em-
bassy said today, "We repeat what we
"said earlier - that Mr. Toth was a
journalist engaged in legitimate jour-
'nalistic activities."
Asked why Soviet authorities are
resurrecting the case, the embassy
spokesman declared: , "Because he's
safely out of the country and they can
afford to say anything they want to."
[William Thomas, editor of the Los.
Angeles Times, called the Tass
charges "ridiculous."]
Tass hinted broadly that it could
prove Toth's connection with U.S. in-
telligence agencies but did not state
so flatly. "Will not those who now
come out as Toth's advocates feel
quite ill at ease if evidence is submit-
ted irrefutably proving the connection
of this so-to-say correspondent with
U.S. intelligence services?" Tass asked
rhetorically.
-
It mentioned specifically the CIA
and "other espionage agencies, related
for instance to the Pentagon" as en-
gaged in "intensive subversive activi-
ties."
The U.S. embassy spokesman here
noted that the Soviets had previously
"hinted darkly that they had informa-
tion that would close the book" on
journalists accused of being CIA
agents.
Three American journalists ac-
cused a year ago in an article in the
government-controlled press of being
CIA agents denied the charge and the
authorities have produced no "proof"
of their alleged intelligence ties.
Toth was detained by the KBG on
June 11 while he was receiving an ar-
ticle on parapsychology from Soviet
scientist Valery -Petukhoy, who' also d
was taken in by the police.
Dissident sources said today that
Petukhov was released after spending
four days in KGB custody.
The dissident sources said the direc-
`tor of the institute where Petukhov
works was summoned to the Interior
Ministry and told to take no action
against him because he had "helped
the KGB expose an arch-intelligence
agent from one of the imperialist
countries."
In other developments:
· Nobel Peace laureate Andrei Sak-
harov and four other dissident physi-
cists appealed to scientists attending
an international conference near Mos-
cow to take up the case of human
rights activist Yuri Orlov, who was ar-
rested last February and reportedly
faces charges of anti-Soviet slander.
. The senior military adviser to the
Soviet U. N. mission was "brutally"
beaten last Thursday by two men near
his home on Manhattan's upper east
side, according to a Soviet letter of
complaint. The Soviet note said the
"premeditated" attack caused "serious
bodily injury" to Col. Vladimir Cher-
nyshev. A New York City police
spokesman said the Soviets never re-
ported the attack and have not al-
lowed them to interview Chernyshev .
since the delivery of the protest note
to U.S. officials yesterday.
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Approved For Release 2001/03/26 : CIA-RDP96-00787R000200080015-8