MOSCOW PROTESTS U.S. TRADE RESTRICTIONS.

Russia’s trade minister yesterday called for an end to the 1974 Jackson-Vanik Amendment and urged the U.S. to grant Moscow permanent most-favored-nation status. Oleg Davydov also complained that the U.S. continued to view Russia as a developing "non-market economy," which he said results in "anti-dumping procedures that are much tougher on Russia than they are on the overwhelming majority of other states." Moscow seeks better access to U.S. markets, Davydov said, and wants lifted "discriminatory" U.S. limitations on trade with Russia. Finally, Davydov said that Moscow wants U.S. investment to go into restructuring the national economy and promotion of high technology and export oriented production rather than into trade and services, as is now often the case. (Itar-Tass, UPI, July 15) Trade issues figure prominently in talks being conducted by U.S. vice president Al Gore and officials accompanying him on his current visit to Moscow.

Davydov’s call for an end to Jackson-Vanik, which makes Russia’s most-favored-nation status conditional upon an annual review to ensure the free emigration of Jews from Russia, comes amid renewed concerns of official anti-Semitism in Russia. In April Russian authorities placed restrictions on the activities of a Jewish emigration agency, and protests caused by that action have still not been resolved. More recently, a leading American spokesman for Soviet Jewry during the 1970’s and 1980’s was refused a visa to enter Russia, and Russian Security Council secretary and presidential national security advisor Aleksandr Lebed made anti-Semitic remarks in public. (See Monitor, July 5)

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