U.S. SETS SUMMIT TO SUPPORT YELTSIN

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, February 26, 1993                   TAG: 9302260077
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: GENEVA                                LENGTH: Short
U.S. SETS SUMMIT TO SUPPORT YELTSIN
President Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin arranged Thursday to meet April 4 in a one-day summit designed to bolster Yeltsin at a time of heightened threats to his leadership and to punctuate U.S. support for "the cause of reform in Russia."
The meeting - Clinton's first venture abroad as president - will be held in a third country, still to be selected.
"It is of the utmost importance to the United States, indeed to the world, that President Yeltsin's reforms succeed," Secretary of State Warren Christopher said at a news conference with Russian Foreign Minister Andrei V. Kozyrev.
"A strong and cooperative U.S.-Russian relationship, a relationship with genuine partnership, is of the highest priority for President Clinton and his administration," Christopher said.
Yeltsin is certain to press for aid beyond the $417 million in technical assistance budgeted for Russia and other former Soviet republics this year.
If Yeltsin is unable to compromise with conservative foes at home, he threatens to gamble on a showdown referendum which would occur on April 11 - a week after the summit.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB