Soviet Dissident Gorbanevskaya Dies In Paris

Natalia Gorbanevskaya, Russian human rights defender

Natalya Gorbanevskaya, one of the former Soviet Union's most prominent dissidents, died in Paris on November 29 at the age of 77.

Gorbanevskaya was arrested for taking part in 1968 in a protest in Moscow's Red Square against the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. She was held in a psychiatric hospital until 1972 and later forced to emigrate to the West.

One of the eight participants in the original 1968 protest, Gorbanevskaya earlier this year took part in another protest held in Red Square to mark the 45th anniversary of the invasion.

She was a poet and translator and a founding member of the underground publication "The Chronicle of Current Events," which documented human rights abuses in the Soviet Union.

Based on reporting by AFP and BBC