Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!enterpoop.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Top lawmaker caves in to Yeltsin Date: Wed, 25 Nov 92 16:20:05 EST Message-ID: Lines: 91 \SE A;WORLD \HD Top lawmaker caves in to Yeltsin \BY Gerald Nadler \CR THE WASHINGTON TIMES \DT MOSCOW MOSCOW - President Boris Yeltsin gave an apparent nod yesterday for 2,000 Siberian coal miners to come to the Russian capital to support him during next week's Congress of People's Deputies and, on the same day, fired the head of state television. Mr. Yeltsin's get-tough policy quickly began showing dividends. Parliament Speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov dropped a threat to strip the president of decree-issuing powers at the Congress session opening Dec. 1. For weeks, Mr. Khasbulatov warned that the 1,042-member Congress would revoke the decree powers it granted Mr. Yeltsin in April along with the authority to name a government without parliamentary approval. Yesterday, he told legislative factions the powers should be extended for 13 months. In his abrupt about-face, Mr. Khasbulatov said: "I, for instance, would support the idea to preserve the extra powers of the president - let's say to the end of 1993." Mr. Khasbulatov has been a constant critic of Mr. Yeltsin's painful economic reforms. In an apparent political dig, Mr. Khasbulatov said, "Mr. Yeltsin has not only not abused the special powers, he has not even used them." Mr. Khasbulatov's cave-in coincided with reports that 2,000 coal miners were arriving by train from Siberia to "provide political and moral" support to Mr. Yeltsin's policies. The miners will stay at the same hotel, the Rossia, as the people's deputies. At the last Congress session in April, 200 miners made the trip to Moscow, forming up each morning in a gantlet through which the deputies had to pass on their way to their meetings. The newspaper Izvestia, a frequent critic of Mr. Khasbulatov, gleefully reported the miners' imminent arrival but did not go into who would pay to put them up in the hotel. Mr. Khasbulatov led the legislative fight against Izvestia's attempts to become an independent newspaper, arguing that the Supreme Soviet always financed its publication and that the paper was always owned by the parliament. Without accusing Mr. Yeltsin of organizing the miners' trip to the capital, the English-language Moscow Times said: "The notion that 2,000 miners would spontaneously decide to come up to Moscow for the congress is laughable." Mr. Yeltsin, who met with the leaders of the Russian Federation's so-called autonomous republics, listened to their complaints about biased press reports on ethnic conflicts, then abruptly fired Yegor Yakovlev, the head of Commonwealth television. Mr. Yeltsin's press spokesman, Vyacheslav Kostikov, said Mr. Yakovlev was dismised becaue of "repeated mistakes in reporting about the ethnic conflicts" inside Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States. The dismissal, which Mr. Yakovlev said he did not expect, removes what was the first voice of former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev's policy of glasnost. Mr. Yakovlev headed the Moscow News, a Soviet publication that was the first to address previously forbidden topics such as the crimes of dictator Josef Stalin and serious environmental problems. Mr. Yeltsin touched all his political support bases this week, promising certain branches of the military-industrial complex 10 percent more for arms next year though the defense budget will not increase. He also attended the funeral of the head of the general staff, Gen. Viktor Dubynin, a much-decorated veteran of the Afghan war who died Sunday at age 49. The Defense Ministry said he died "after a long illness." The Congress of People's Deputies, the parent body of the Supreme Soviet, meets twice a year. The December session had looked as if it would be a showdown between Mr. Yeltsin's executive branch and the much more conservative legislature. The past few days saw a flurry of concessions from both camps. It is hard to tell if a true compromise was achieved or if one or both sides blinked. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM