When [Mikhail S. Gorbachev] met Thursday with Premier Laurent Fabius, the latter handed him a list of seven cases of violations of freedom in the Soviet Union. Neither Fabius nor Gorbachev made the list public, but a French government spokesman described one case as that of a political prisoner and the six others as cases of husbands and wives or parents and children unable to see or live with each other because of travel restrictions.

Gorbachev's problems with the issue began on the day before he arrived when a French television channel telecast a live interview with the Soviet leader from Moscow. Gorbachev seemed smooth and thoughtful at first but lost his temper when news anchor Yves Mourousi asked if there were 4 million political prisoners in the Soviet Union.

France banned all street marches and demonstrations during the visit, but that did not prevent an incident while Gorbachev was laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Arc de Triomphe. A Frenchman, carrying the flag of the organization of children of Jews murdered in Nazi extermination camps, tried to rush at Gorbachev with a letter. But police grabbed him and hustled him away.