Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 25, 1993 TAG: 9303250209
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE: MOSCOW LENGTH: Medium
OPPONENTS REBUFF YELTSIN
Russian President Boris Yeltsin dropped his demand to rule by decree Wednesday and implied it had been a mistake, but furious lawmakers pushed ahead with plans to convene the Parliament and try to oust him.After Yeltsin's stab at peace talks with his two key foes, the heads of the Parliament and the Constitutional Court, had failed, lawmakers called a session of the Congress of People's Deputies for Friday to bring Russia's escalating power struggle to a showdown.
"The presidency is losing its legitimacy," Parliament Chairman Ruslan Khasbulatov said. "Holding a congress now is in the interest of all of society."
Amid continuing uncertainty over whether Yeltsin's opponents in the conservative congress can gather the two-thirds majority needed to depose him, the possible scenarios painted by his allies grew increasingly apocalyptic.
If the 1,033-member congress votes to oust Yeltsin but he rejects the move as illegal, both the country and the army will split into two armed camps, said Mikhail A. Fedotov, Yeltsin's information minister. And if that happens, "each side will have a few thousand atomic bombs," he added. "You can imagine what the results would be."
Wednesday evening, some of Yeltsin's top strategists conferred urgently at a Moscow think tank, openly expressing fears that within two days Yeltsin might be impeached, removed from office and arrested, and that his constitutional successor, Vice President Alexander Rutskoi, could ban new elections.
Some aides insisted Khasbulatov is bluffing, and cannot muster the needed two-thirds to remove Yeltsin.
Yeltsin had begun the day with a clear move toward compromise, finally issuing a much-softened decree that formalized the bombshell declaration that he made last Saturday night, that he planned to introduce a "special regime" and rule by decree until a referendum on the presidency.
But the decree published Wednesday does not mention emergency rule; it also omits Yeltsin's previous demand that if he wins a popular vote of confidence, early elections must be called to replace the congress.