Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 7, 1990 TAG: 9004070262
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
After a series of three high-level meetings over the past six months that recorded dramatic strides toward more cooperative relations, officials on both sides described this week's discussions as disappointing.
"I will not hide from you the fact that here in Washington . . . we have encountered certain difficulties, certain problems," said Shevardnadze in summing up arms-control aspects of the talks at a news conference late Friday. He ascribed some of the difficulties to political pressures at home from the newly empowered Soviet legislature.
At a separate news conference, Secretary of State James Baker said it was "a disappointment" that the two sides had not settled two major issues in the way of a strategic arms agreement: the limitations on sea-launched and air-launched cruise missiles.
The tense situation in Lithuania was a major topic of discussions during Shevardnadze's visit. The U.S. side warned Shevardnadze of serious consequences if Moscow uses force against the Lithuanians. Shevardnadze said "we have a clear conscience" about efforts to discourage the independence movement in the Baltic republic, whose forcible inclusion in the Soviet Union in 1940 has never been formally accepted by the United States.
U.S. officials said privately that movement that had been achieved during Baker's Feb. 7-9 mission to Moscow toward agreement on cruise missile issues was largely reversed by Soviet positions in the latest talks.
A U.S. official described Soviet "back-sliding" on several arms issues. Soviet negotiators said their earlier positions had been misunderstood.
"It was a swing of the pendulum that was bound to occur" after the strides of recent months, said a U.S. official. The just-completed meetings were "not a spectacular advance or a serious setback. It was just an event. It just happened," he said.
Baker and Shevardnadze both expressed hope they can break the deadlocks on arms control issues at their next meeting, May 16-19 in the Soviet Union - just two weeks before Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev is to arrive in Washington for a summit.
After a long White House meeting with Shevardnadze Friday, President Bush told the American Society of Newspaper Editors he was telling Moscow that arms control and all other issues on the Soviet-American agenda could be affected by the situation in Lithuania. "We have an awful lot at stake in the U.S.-Soviet relationship, an enormous amount at stake."
Bush added, "It gets into arms control, it gets into human rights, the exodus of Soviet Jews. It gets into regional questions. And this is a major relationship that affects the lives of people all over the world."
Baker said both he and Bush had emphasized during the talks that "a process for producing a peaceful resolution" in Lithuania must be found. Baker said he encouraged Shevardnadze to develop further the idea of a referendum as a means of expressing the will of the Lithuanian people, an idea he said the Lithuanians have accepted in principle.
Baker declared, "The signal has been clearly sent, directly delivered, is clearly understood in my opinion, that [Lithuania] is a matter of extraordinary importance to the United States. It involves our fundamental principles and involves a position that we have held for over 40 years. So it's very, very important."
Shevardnadze, speaking to reporters in the rain as he left the White House after meeting with Bush for two hours and 20 minutes, called Lithuania "a domestic affair for the Soviet Union" but nevertheless said he was ready to discuss it with anyone. "We have a clear conscience on this as regards the Lithuanian people and clear conscience as regards all our people in our country."
Calling Lithuania "a multi-ethnic republic" with differing views about secession from the Soviet Union, Shevardnadze hinted at possible use of police, militia or military forces. "If certain administrative measures are taken, it is something we don't like. But we have to do it, in order to make sure there is public order and that there are no serious complications or inter-ethnic clashes."
by CNB