The World - News from May 8, 1988

A Soviet opposition group calling itself the Democratic Union held an organizational meeting in Moscow to establish a political party as an alternative to the Communist Party, a leading dissident said. Police, including some ranking officers, gathered outside the downtown apartment building where the meeting was held. Dissident Sergei Grigoryants, who was not a participant, said he did not know of any arrests. He said as many as 250 people from Moscow, Leningrad, Novosibirsk and the Ukraine met to discuss goals, but there was no confirmation of that figure.