The World - News from April 5, 1989

The Soviet Union’s leading writers have formed a chapter of the international writers organization PEN and, in their first action, appealed for revocation of calls for death for Salman Rushdie, author of the novel “The Satanic Verses.” The writers declared that they condemned both insults to religious and ethnic feelings as well as demands for retribution, the weekly Literary Gazette said. Iran’s leader, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, has called for the death of Rushdie for what he considers insults to Islam in the novel.