76 HUMAN LIFE IN RUSSIA
refused these unfortunates permission to stay on the ground
of a new passport law. Muggeridge, Berland and other eye-
witnesses have described the intense distress caused by this
system and the attendant expulsion of the victims, above all
to the so-called lyshentsy, the "anti-State" elements, in fact the
unemployed.
Another measure for getting rid of the famine victims was
their banishment to the north, to Siberia and to other remote
regions. The system of banishment now reached its climax.
Thousands of people had to vanish at the shortest notice into
distant regions, where nobody could see them or trace their
fate. Most of them never returned. Only by accident does news
come now and again that they have disappeared or died. This
method, which was employed more than any other towards
the Ukrainians, the Volga Germans and others, is dealt with
elsewhere.1
To the same category belong all those measures taken by
the Kremlin with the object of hermetically shutting off the
Russian provinces from the outer world—such as the pro-
hibition of all travel to the provinces by journalists and other
foreigners, except under the complete control of the' Intourist"
organization and other Soviet authorities. As for Russian
nationals, they were prevented from getting out of the country
and reporting the true position by the most rigorous methods,
including the death penalty and the persecution of the emigres9
relatives.2 These measures taken by the Government did, in fact,
succeed in rendering the famine almost invisible as compared
with 1933.
Nevertheless, we have irrefutable evidence regarding the
famine and the deaths caused by it during this second phase
of the catastrophe. First of all, statements in the Soviet press,
from the autumn of 1933 onwards, contained unmistakable
hints (certainly not intended for foreign countries) of the
continuance and intensification of the famine. As early as
1 See Chapter IV, "Moscow's Attitude." 2 Ibid.