 On 13 September 1965, Andrei Sinyavsky was arrested, and Yuli Daniel's arrest followed five days later.Initially, leaders of the CPSU were hesitant about prosecuting Sinyavsky and Daniel, but the trial pressed ahead under the initiative of General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, the new leader of the Soviet Union.Brezhnev personally consulted with Konstantin Fedin, the head of the Union of Soviet Writers of which Sinyavsky was an official member.