Reagan Prods Soviets: ‘Free Prisoners’

President Reagan today urged the Kremlin to free political prisoners in a hard-hitting human rights speech that angered Soviet officials and led one to say it could cause “a lot of problems” at the Moscow summit.

Declaring that international security is indivisible from respect for human rights, Reagan said he would like Moscow and its Eastern European allies to embrace the humanitarian values that define American and Western European civilization.

Reagan delivered his speech in the same hall where 35 nations, including the Soviet Union and the United States, signed the Helsinki Final Act on human rights and security issues at the end of the first European Security Conference in 1975.

“Thirteen years after the Final Act was signed, it is difficult to understand why cases of divided families and blocked marriages should remain on the East-West agenda, or why Soviet citizens who wish to emigrate should be subject to artificial quotas and arbitrary rulings,” Reagan said.

“And what are we to think of the continued suppression of those who wish to practice their religious beliefs?” he asked.

“Over 300 men and women whom the world sees as political prisoners have been released. There remains no reason why the Soviet Union cannot release all people still in jail for expression of political or religious belief, or for organizing to monitor the Helsinki Act,” the President said.

First Visit to Russia

Reagan spoke two days before he flies to Moscow for talks with Kremlin leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev. It will be Reagan’s first visit to the nation he once called the “evil empire” and the first superpower summit on Soviet soil since 1974.

Soviet officials in Moscow responded angrily to Reagan’s speech, suggesting its tone boded ill for the summit.

“If that is an example of what we can expect next week, it could cause a lot of problems,” said one official who had watched the address live on an American television relay at the summit press center in the Soviet capital.

“It was pretty-sounding but it was condescending and also out-of-date,” said another. “His speech writers seem to be about three weeks behind the times.”

“These are all issues we are addressing ourselves openly and publicly now,” another Soviet official who saw the speech commented. “There have been moves ahead even in the last few days. He seems to be totally unaware of it.”