He was born in Leningrad in 1936 to a family of engineers. His family did not observe Jewish traditions and was not Zionistically inclined, but his parents in their time obtained Jewish upbringing, and this was manifested in the family pattern and (subsequently) in the explicit pro-Israeli sympathies. In 1978 he applied to the Leningrad “OVIR” (Department of visas and registration of foreigners) with the request for the exit visa to leave for Israel, but was refused. In 1976 he entered Mikhail Nosovsky’s ulpan to study Hebrew and also participated in “associated activities". After this he taught Hebrew himself (in his own ulpan at home) and participated in various forms of the fight of refuseniks for free emigration to Israel, for the human rights and for the saving of Jewish culture in the USSR. He published articles in Jewish samizdat (‘Leningrad Jewish Almanac’). Also participated in the seminars and the cultural events, meetings with political figures and intellectuals and tourists from Israel and different Western countries. In June 1985 he was arrested according to the article 190−1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ‘creation, distribution or storage of the materials, which contain the knowingly false fabrications, discrediting Soviet state and social system’. Several of his private letters, illegally perlustrated by the KGB, figured as such materials. The trial took place in August 1985; he was sentenced to 3 years of imprisonment in medium security camps of the Gulag. Served his time in tens of prisons and camps in the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan. Was released in February 1987, but his request for the exit visa was refused again. Only in January 1989 he and his wife Galina received permission to go. Zlichenok settled in Haifa and worked at The Israel Electric Corporation. He passed away on the 9th of December 2024.
