Errors-to: owner-rferl-daily-report@AdminA.RFERL.ORG
MIME-version: 1.0
Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
Approved-By:  rferl-daily-report-request@ADMINA.RFERL.ORG
Newsgroups: misc.news.east-europe.rferl
Date:         Mon, 28 Dec 1992 13:37:22 +0100
Reply-To:     rferl-daily-report-request@AdminA.RFERL.ORG
From:         rferl-daily-report-request@admina.rferl.org
Subject:      RFE/RL Daily Report 28 DEC, 1992

The RFE/RL Daily Report is a digest of the latest developments
in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. It is published
Monday through Friday (except German holidays) by the RFE/RL
Research Institute (a division of Radio Free Europe/Radio
Liberty, Inc.). Copyright 1992 RFE/RL, Inc.


----------------------------------------------------------------
                    RFE/RL Daily Report

                                       No. 247, 28 December 1992

                   SUCCESSOR STATES TO THE USSR

UKRAINE RAISES PRICES. As the result of a government decree on 22
December, Ukrainian consumers have found their cost of living
sharply increased, Western news agencies reported on 26 December.
For example, in Kiev, the price of bread rose six times, a subway
ticket ten times. According to Interfax on 25 December, Ukrainians
can expect further price hikes at the start of the new year,
including a 50% rise in train tickets, a doubling of costs for
communications services and a 60% increase in housing rents.
(Erik Whitlock, RFE/RL, Inc.)

PROTESTS IN KIEV AGAINST PRICE INCREASES. Several thousand people
protested against price increases in Kiev on 26 December, CIS and
Western agencies reported. In a televised speech shown that
evening, the Ukrainian Prime Minister Leonid Kuchma defended what
he described as "these unpopular measures," saying that the
government had no choice. "We have spoken for a long time about
the need for drastic economic reform in Ukraine, but instead of
planned action we have been passively following catastrophes in
the economy," he said. "We can wait no longer." That same
afternoon, his deputy, Viktor Pynzenyk, announced that the minimum
salaries for December would be increased from 2,300 Ukrainian
karbovantsi per month to 3,400.  On 27 December, according to
INTERFAX, a Ukrainian delegation headed by energy minister Yulii
Yoffe left for Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan to try and ensure
adequate fuel supplies in the coming year.  (Bohdan Nahaylo,
RFE/RL, Inc.)

NEW RUSSIAN CABINET; OPPOSITION IS CRITICAL. Prime Minister Viktor
Chernomyrdin selected a cabinet that is only slightly different
from the old one, ITAR-TASS reported on 23 December. All key
ministers, including Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev, remain.  Two
new deputy prime ministers--Boris Fedorov and Yurii Yarov--have
been appointed. Fedorov will be responsible for reform strategy;
Yarov for economic relations with other CIS states.  Parliamentary
speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov and the Civic Union leaders Vasilii
Lipitsky and Aleksandr Vladislavlev complained that President
Yeltsin had exerted too great an influence over the choices and
that Chernomyrdin had been "deprived" of the opportunity to form
his own government in order to implement a new economic reform
program.  (Alexander Rahr, RFE/RL, Inc.)

FEDOROV: RUSSIA WILL CONTINUE REFORM POLICY. Russia's new deputy
prime minister in charge of economic strategy, Boris Fedorov, said
that he wants to continue pursuing the economic reform policy of
former Acting Prime Minister Egor Gaidar.  ITAR-TASS on 25
December quoted Fedorov as saying that there is no need to write a
new economic program. He stated that he might seek cooperation
with economist Grigorii Yavlinsky, who had some differences with
Gaidar. Yavlinsky and Fedorov worked together on the famous "500
days program" for the transition to a market economy in 1990. Both
had been members of the first Russian government under the
leadership of Boris Yeltsin.  Gaidar praised the appointment of
Fedorov.  Fedorov has served as Russia's executive director at the
World Bank in Washington and managing director of the European
Bank for Reconstruction and Development in London. (Alexander
Rahr, RFE/RL, Inc.)

BUT FEDOROV'S POSITION IS NOT ENTIRELY CLEAR.  Although economics
minister Boris Fedorov told ITAR-TASS on 25 December that the
Chernomyrdin government should hold to the "general line" of Egor
Gaidar's economic reform program, rather than coming up with one
of its own, it was not clear exactly what he had in mind.  While
pointing to inflation as the leading problem in Russia, he called
for "softening the blows" on the state sector in its transition to
a market economy. He also urged an elimination of the
dollarization of the Russian economy, but suggested that actions
taken towards this end in the near future would not be effective.
(Erik Whitlock, RFE/RL, Inc.)

RUSSIAN FEDERAL INFORMATION CENTER CREATED.  President Yeltsin has
decreed the creation of a new Russian Federal Information Center
to control Russia's state-financed mass media, ITAR-TASS reported
on 26 December. Mikhail Poltoranin was appointed head of the
center and given the status of a first deputy prime minister.
Poltoranin resigned from his previous post as information minister
last month to appease hardliners on the eve of the Congress.  His
comeback is a clear sign that Yeltsin is unwilling to surrender
his power to the opposition. The center will be subordinated
directly to the president and, according to Poltoranin, will
ensure that the media provide accurate and truthful information
concerning the reforms. (Alexander Rahr, RFE/RL, Inc.)

RIGHT-WING POLITICIAN TO STAND FOR MOSCOW MAYOR.  The extreme
Russian nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky announced on 26 December
that he would run for the post of Moscow mayor.  Elections are
expected in February 1993.  In 1991, Zhirinovsky finished third in
Russian presidential elections. ITAR-TASS reported that
Zhirinovsky handed out free tea and cakes at a rally in Moscow,
and urged Muscovites to elect him mayor and "in future, president
of Russia." Zhirinovsky calls for the recreation of the Russian
empire within its pre-February 1917 borders. (Vera Tolz, RFE/RL,
Inc.)

KOZYREV OPPOSES UN MILITARY ACTION VS. SERBS IN BOSNIA. Russian
Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev stated on 26 December that "there
was no alternative to the peace process" in Bosnia, and that UN
military action would "lead nowhere," Western agencies reported.
Kozyrev said that the use of force would be counterproductive,
have unpredictable consequences, and that it would increase human
suffering in the region. (Hal Kosiba, RFE/RL, Inc.)

CIS INTERPARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY MEETS IN ST. PETERSBURG. The CIS
Interparliamentary Assembly is holding its second plenary meeting
in St. Petersburg on 28 December, ITAR-TASS reported.  Among the
participants are the heads of the Russian and Kyrgyz parliaments,
Ruslan Khasbulatov and Medetkan Sherimkulov.  Only seven of the
CIS states (Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan,
Tajikistan and Armenia) signed the agreement last March on the
establishment of this body, and they are regarded as the members
that would be prepared to accept a greater measure of integration.
On his arrival from Moscow on 27 December, Khasbulatov announced
that from now on meetings of the CIS Interparliamentary Assembly
would be held in St.  Petersburg, the city designated to serve as
its headquarters. (Bohdan Nahaylo, RFE/RL, Inc.)

KRAVCHUK CONDEMNS INTEGRATIONIST PRESSURE ON CIS MEMBERS.  On 23
December, on his return from an official visit to Egypt, Ukrainian
president Leonid Kravchuk criticized the CIS as an ineffective
organization and said that there had not been sufficient
groundwork for the CIS summit scheduled for 24 December, but
postponed until 22 January. According to Radio Ukraine, Kravchuk
said that the CIS charter that was being proposed "is close to the
[Union] treaty of 1922." With the "main problems" still not
settled, he said, it is "impermissible to resolve all these things
by pressure." Kravchuk contrasted this with the approach to
European integration. He pointed out that the question of the
entry of European states into a European community was being
decided by referendums and the wishes of the respective states
were being taken into account. In any case, he added, the CIS had
"shown itself to be fully ineffective in resolving complex
issues," and he doubted if it could be "reanimated." "If anything
has been settled," the Ukrainian president stressed, "it is only
in the framework of bilateral relations." (Bohdan Nahaylo, RFE/RL,
Inc.)

NIYAZOV WANTS CIS TO BE CONSULTATIVE BODY ONLY.  Turkmenistan's
President Saparmurad Niyazov told a plenum of the political
council of his Democratic Party (formerly Communist Party) that
Turkmenistan is interested in the Commonwealth of Independent
States only as a consultative body, ITAR-TASS reported on 23
December. He rejected the proposals of other CIS leaders that the
Commonwealth assume a larger coordinating role, at least in
economic matters.  Niyazov still wants relations between CIS
member states to be bilateral, and has warned that his country
might withdraw if central coordinating bodies are set up.  (Bess
Brown, RFE/RL, Inc.)

GORBACHEV ON BREAKUP OF THE UNION, YELTSIN AND THE CONGRESS. In an
interview on the Ostankino TV on 27 December, former Soviet
President Mikhail Gorbachev called the breakup of the Soviet Union
a "tragic mistake." He claimed that "what happened was not
dictated by necessity and had very hard consequences for the whole
country, for all of the republics." He said the CIS failed to meet
expectations as a successor to the USSR. Gorbachev denied
accusations that he left behind a legacy that included a crumbling
economy and ethnic conflicts. Instead, he blamed his successors
for the trouble. His main criticism was leveled against President
Yeltsin.  The former Soviet leader praised the latest Russian
Congress of People's Deputies and said it offered a welcome
centrist alternative to the impulsive Yeltsin and the radicals on
both sides.  When his interviewer pointed out that the Congress is
largely regarded as conservative, Gorbachev called such a
description "dishonest." (Vera Tolz, RFE/RL, Inc.)

RUSSIAN SOCIAL SECURITY: NEW LAW AND NEW FIGURES.  The Russian
parliament passed a law on 25 December defining contributions
business are to make to the national social security fund,
Interfax reported. State and non-state firms alike will be
required to pay 5.4% of their wage bill to the fund.  In a related
story, the Chairman of the Russian Pension Fund, Aleksandr Kostin,
said that 50 million Russians qualified for pensions, but only
35.5 million were receiving support. No explanation was given for
the difference. In other socio-economic news, Trud reported on 23
December that the number of officially unemployed in December rose
to 518,000. This is up from 61,900 at the beginning of the year
and 367,000 in October.  (Erik Whitlock, RFE/RL, Inc.)

MB STAFF HEADQUARTERS WILL BE DIRECTED BY KGB VETERAN. President
Yeltsin has appointed Nikolai Golushko chief of staff in the
Ministry of Security (MB) and the first deputy of the Minister of
Security, according to Krasnaya zvezda of 25 December.  This is
the first official mention of the existence of a staff unit within
the structure of the MB (the former KGB) A similar unit was set up
within the old KGB by General Filipp Bobkov in 1988; then it
exercised operative command over the troops attached to the KGB.
Newly appointed General Nikolai Golushko was the chairman of
Ukrainian KGB during the perestroika period; he was also a member
of the KGB's top administrative body, the Collegium. After the
disbanding of the USSR in 1991, Golushko joined the MB as a deputy
to its minister, Viktor Barannikov. Creation of the MB staff unit
suggests that the ministry already has or will have paramilitary
troops under its command. (Victor Yasmann, RFE/RL, Inc.)

UKRAINE TO DESTROY SOME STRATEGIC MISSILES.  Ukrainian President
Leonid Kravchuk on 23 December said that the 130 Russian-built
SS-19 missiles on Ukrainian territory would have to be dismantled
with Russian assistance, but "if the situation aggravates" the 46
SS-24 missiles in Ukraine would be destroyed by the Ukrainians.
(The solid-fueled SS-24s were built at Pervomaysk, Ukraine.)
According to Interfax, Kravchuk repeated Ukraine's intention to
become nuclear-free. He spoke with U.S. President George Bush on
24 December by telephone regarding Ukraine's ratification of the
Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START). Interfax reported that
the two presidents "attached great importance" to Russia and
Ukraine reaching an agreement allowing Russian experts to maintain
the strategic weapons on Ukrainian territory.  (Doug Clarke,
RFE/RL, Inc.)

REMINDER ON SURRENDER OF ANTI-GOVERNMENT TAJIK FORCES. The
deadline of 28 December has been set by Tajikistan's government
for anti-government fighters to surrender their weapons,
pro-government military leader Sangak Safarov reminded the
opposition on Tajik TV, Interfax reported on 27 December.  Talks
are also expected to begin between Tajik government
representatives and Afghan officials on the fate of the thousands
of Tajik refugees who have fled to Afghanistan. Tajik Prime
Minister Abdumalik Abdullodzonov said in an interview published in
Nezavisimaya gazeta on 23 December that there are some 800,000
refugees and homeless people in Tajikistan.  Tajik Supreme Soviet
Chairman Imomali Rakhmonov was quoted by Interfax on 25 December
as saying that anti-government fighters were forcing people to go
to Afghanistan, a claim denied by the refugees themselves. (Bess
Brown, RFE/RL, Inc.)

POLICE BEAT DEMONSTRATORS IN BAKU. Demonstrators who demanded
suspension of a parliamentary decision to rename Azerbaijan's
state language "Turkish" were beaten by police and some were
arrested on 25 December in Baku, an RFE/RL correspondent reported.
The demonstration was organized by Azerbaijan's Social Democratic
Party. The following day, the chairman of the party, Araz Alizade,
told an RFE/RL correspondent in an interview that state
prosecutors are prosecuting him for slander because he allegedly
called President Abulfaz Elchibey a fascist. Azerbaijan's foreign
minister said on 23 December that the language name-change was
unconstitutional. Some oppositionists have called for a referendum
on the issue. (Bess Brown, RFE/RL, Inc.)

MOLDOVAN BACKLASH AGAINST ROMANIAN CALLS FOR UNIFICATION.
Addressing Moldova's Parliament on 24 December, President Mircea
Snegur decried the recent statements of Romanian officials and of
the opposition Moldovan Popular Front pressing for
Romanian-Moldovan unification.  Describing these statements as "a
campaign against Moldovan statehood," Snegur implied that Moldova
should hold a referendum over the question of independent
statehood vs. unification with Romania. The parliament's Vice
Chairman, Victor Puscasu, who is an organizer of the pro-Snegur,
pro-independence and anti-unification Moldovan Republican Party,
told Interfax on 27 December that a referendum should be held
shortly. Such a referendum has long been advocated by
anti-unification Moldovan groups and is being opposed by the
pro-unification Popular Front.  (Vladimir Socor, RFE/RL, Inc.)

                    CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE

MILOSEVIC REELECTION CONFIRMED. International media report that
Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic's reelection has been
officially confirmed. New ballots are to be held in about 200
voting places in response to charges of irregularities, but even
if challenger Milan Panic were to take all of the votes in those
precincts, it would not be enough to affect the overall result of
the election. Milosevic's Socialists lack an absolute majority in
Parliament, but are expected to govern in an alliance with the
ultranationalist Serbian Radical Party of Vojislav Seselj, which
made huge gains in the latest contest. The socialists went from
194 to 101 seats out of 250, while Seselj's party rose from one to
73 deputies to become the second largest group in the legislature.
Five seats went to the party around the freebooter known as Arkan,
who, together with Seselj and others, has been named by US
Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger as a likely candidate for
eventual war-crimes trials.  DEPOS, the leading opposition party,
won about 50 seats; in addition the Hungarian minority won 9
seats, and the Muslims 1, the 28 December Frankfurter Allgemeine
Zeitung reports.  The Socialists and Radicals are similarly the
two largest Serbian delegations in the new rump Yugoslav
parliament as well.  The presidential election in Montenegro,
however, will require a second round. (Patrick Moore, RFE/RL,
Inc.)

US WARNS SERBS OVER KOSOVO; OTHER DEVELOPMENTS.  The 28 December
New York Times reports that the American leadership has warned its
Serbian counterparts both orally and in writing against extending
the war to Kosovo. The written message said that "in the event of
conflict in Kosovo caused by Serbian action, the United States
will be prepared to employ military force against the Serbs in
Kosovo and in Serbia proper." The paper added that rump Yugoslav
President Dobrica Cosic is particularly upset by the American
message.  Meanwhile, Tanjug on 25 December said that rump Yugoslav
Prime Minister Milan Panic has accepted an invitation to attend
the inauguration of President-elect Bill Clinton on 20 January.
Western news agencies on 26 December reported that $236,000-worth
of equipment intended for the independent Serbian TV station
Studio-B was hijacked. Station officials said that the theft was
politically motivated since their broadcasts are critical of the
Milosevic government.  (Patrick Moore, RFE/RL, Inc.)

UPDATE FROM THE YUGOSLAV AREA. International media on Christmas
day reported two mortar attacks on the UN headquarters in
Sarajevo.  UN officials said the shelling was deliberate and
blamed Bosnian forces.  On 27 December Croatian President Franjo
Tudjman said that there has been progress in his Geneva talks with
Muslim leader Alija Izetbegovic on the future political shape of
Bosnia and its frontiers. Tudjman is representing Bosnian and
Herzegovinian Croats, while Izetbegovic's term as Bosnian
president expired on 22 December. Elsewhere, Western news agencies
quoted Macedonian President Kiro Gligorov as saying that the cost
of nonrecognition has been "enormous" for his republic, which is
now going to the UN rather than the EC in search of a diplomatic
opening. Greek officials told reporters in Athens that Greece is
sending representatives to key capitals abroad to present the case
against recognition. Reuters on 24 December quoted Macedonia's
interior minister as saying that his republic would close its
border with Kosovo if war breaks out there. (Patrick Moore,
RFE/RL, Inc.)

SKUBISZEWSKI COMMENTS ON BALKAN CONFLICT. At a press conference on
his return from the US and Belgium on 23 December, Polish Foreign
Minister Krzysztof Skubiszewski said that he and the foreign
ministers of Austria, Hungary, and Slovenia, members of the
Central European Initiative, presented a joint stand on the Balkan
conflict to the UN secretary-general, the chairman of the Security
Council and the US President.  PAP quoted Skubiszewski as saying
that the four argued in favor of using force to implement Security
Council resolutions in the region where CSCE standards are
increasingly neglected. Skubiszewski said that warning measures
should precede any direct use of force. He advocated preventive
measures to avoid escalation of the conflict in Macedonia and
Kosovo.  (Anna Sabbat-Swidlicka, RFE/RL, Inc.)

ROMANIA TO RELEASE EMPTY YUGOSLAV VESSELS.  Radio Bucharest
announced on 24 December that Romania will release all those
vessels belonging to rump Yugoslavia which were sailing without
cargoes and which were halted in Danube ports in the past month in
observance of UN sanctions. The radio carried a statement by the
Foreign Ministry saying the release of the vessels is in line with
a decision adopted by the UN sanctions committee at Bucharest's
request.  Romania has been complaining that its Danube ports are
jammed. The ministry statement said nothing about the fate of the
rump Yugoslav and other vessels carrying goods and detained by
Romania.  (Michael Shafir, RFE/RL, Inc.).

CZECH AND SLOVAK REPUBLICS AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS. The
Czechoslovak Foreign Ministry expects no problems with the
integration of Czechoslovakia's successor states into
international organizations, CTK reported on 25 December. A
majority of organizations, including the IMF, the CSCE, the World
Bank, the EBRD, and the North Atlantic Council (uniting NATO
members and nonmembers) have already decided to admit both
republics on 1 January 1993. The UN is expected to admit the two
new states in January and both will automatically become members
of many of the UN's sub-organizations, including UNESCO.  The
Czech Republic is, moreover, a candidate for temporary membership
on the UN Security Council (to be elected in September).  The
Council of Europe will decide about the admission of the two
states at its May session. The association agreement between
Czechoslovakia and the EC (which has been signed but not ratified
by all EC members) will apparently not be automatically
transferred to the two successor states, and some observers expect
that individual EC members will insist on a renegotiation in order
to lower the two new states' export quotas. (Jan Obrman, RFE/RL,
Inc.)

CZECHS, SLOVAKS AGREE ON GAS PIPELINE. On 23 December Czech
Minister of Industry and Trade Vladimir Dlouhy and his Slovak
counterpart, Ludovit Cermak, reached agreement on the
controversial gas pipeline that has been providing natural gas
from the former Soviet Union to both republics, agencies reported.
The Czech and Slovak state-owned gas companies will jointly
establish a subsidiary and each of the two partners will control
50% of its shares.  The subsidiary will have the exclusive right
to handle contracts with third parties involved in the
transactions, namely Russia, which is delivering the gas, and
Ukraine, through whose territory the pipeline runs. The ministers
hailed the agreement as an important breakthrough that takes into
consideration the strategic and economic interests of both
republics. (Jan Obrman, RFE/RL, Inc.)

KLAUS, MECIAR MEET IN BRATISLAVA.  The prime ministers of the
Czech Republic and Slovakia, Vaclav Klaus and Vladimir Meciar, met
in Bratislava on 27 December, Czech Radio reports. They confirmed
that the privatization methods applied in their republics will
differ in the future.  In the Czech Republic the system of voucher
privatization will enter its second round, but it will be
terminated in Slovakia after 1 January 1993. Klaus made it clear,
however, that all property that remains in the hands of the Czech
state after the second round of voucher privatization will be sold
off by "standard methods of privatization." Klaus also said after
the meeting that the position of the Czech ambassador to Slovakia
will be more significant than that of a Czech minister. He
announced a state visit to Slovakia for the first week of January.
(Jan Obrman, RFE/RL, Inc.)

SILESIAN STRIKES RESUME AFTER CHRISTMAS BREAK.  On 28 December
miners in the 65 Silesian coal mines resumed the industrial action
that was begun on 14 December to protest delays in the
restructuring of the mining industry and the Silesian region.
Over Christmas the action had been transformed into an "absentee
strike," with the miners staying at home and only essential
service workers and representatives of the strike committees
present in the mines.  Reduced amounts of coal are being mined for
the needs of heating plants, coke plants, and steelworks. The
Silesian railway strike on the other hand was suspended on 24
December after talks among government, railway management, and
unions led to the establishment of a mixed commission to determine
means of settling the most important of the railway workers' 12
demands and agree upon deadlines.  The next round of talks will
take place on 29 December. (Anna Sabbat-Swidlicka, RFE/RL, Inc.)

POLISH MINIMUM WAGE IN 1993.  At a 23 December meeting between
representatives of Solidarity and the National Trade Union
Alliance on the one hand and the Ministry of Labor and Social
Policy on the other, it was agreed that the minimum wage in the
first three months of 1993 will be 1.5 million zloty, PAP reports.
The government believes that in 1992 the minimum wage has risen
faster than the average national income and has proposed talks on
new methods of indexing the minimum wage.  (Anna Sabbat-Swidlicka,
RFE/RL, Inc.)

MICHAEL CANCELS VISIT. In a press release on 23 December Romania's
exiled King Michael announced that he has been forced "to
postpone" his planned Christmas visit to Romania. The statement
said the authorities in Bucharest imposed unacceptable conditions
at the last minute.  Among other things, they demanded that the
king formally recognize the country's republican institutions and
submit to a body search at the border; the statement called these
"neo-Stalinist methods." Romanian TV carried the text of the
message on 23 December. The following day the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs denied that new conditions had been imposed for the king's
visit, apart from insistence that it be "of a private character,"
but admitted that officials had discussed with a representative of
the king what were called "problems concerning the regulation of
the king's citizenship and his ties with the Romanian state."
(Michael Shafir, RFE/RL, Inc.)

LANGUAGE REGULATIONS FOR HUNGARIAN MINORITY IN UKRAINE.  MTI
reported on 23 December that Mykhailo Krayilo, the Ukrainian
president's plenipoteniatry representative in the Transcarpathia
region, has issued new regulations promoting widespread use of
minority languages.  The regulations implement the Ukraine's laws
on language and minorities. Leaders of the Transcarpathian
Hungarian minority, numbering more than 150,000, as well as the
Hungarian government welcomed the news.  The new regulations
require street and office signs in minority languages in places
where most of the population is not Ukrainian.  In these areas
state employees will be required to have facility in the minority
language. (Karoly Okolicsanyi, RFE/RL, Inc.)

FIVE CHARGED IN BULGARIAN LABOR CAMP KILLINGS.  The prosecutor's
office of the Bulgarian armed forces has charged five former
communist officials with responsibility for a large number of
deaths in two labor camps operating between 1959 and 1962,
Standart wrote on 24 December.  The defendants, former Interior
Minister Mircho Spasov and four senior camp officials, could face
20 years imprisonment or death sentences. Bulgarian media broke
the story of the brutal regime in the Lovech and Skravena camps in
the spring of 1990, and later a government commission concluded
that 147 of 1,235 inmates had died there. Despite efforts to prove
the involvement of ex-dictator Todor Zhivkov, a court source told
AFP there is "not enough evidence" to bring him to trial. (Kjell
Engelbrekt, RFE/RL, Inc.)

LATVIA APPROVES AMENDMENTS TO STATE BUDGET. On 23 December the
Supreme Council approved amendments to the 1992 budget proposed by
the Council of Ministers, Baltfax reports.  The state budget
deficit was increased to 3.8 billion Latvian rubles and the hard
currency deficit to $16 million.  The spending deficit is
connected with rising energy prices and the need to pay state
allowances of 1,500 rubles a month to enable less well-off
residents to pay for heating.  (Saulius Girnius, RFE/RL, Inc.)

ELECTIONS IN LITHUANIA.  On 22 December the Lithuanian Seimas
adopted a law on the elections of a president to be held on 14
February, BNS reports. The opposition did not take part in the
vote, accusing the majority of acting unconstitutionally since the
law provides for creating a special commission for presidential
elections to replace the existing Supreme Elections Commission.
The Seimas also decided to change the date of local council
elections in Vilnius, Salcininkai, and Visaginas (the former
Snieckus) raions from 23 January to 14 February. (Saulius Girnius,
RFE/RL, Inc.)

LITHUANIAN MEMBERSHIP IN COUNCIL OF EUROPE.  On 23 December Gret
Haller, the head of a delegation of the Human Rights Subcommittee
of the Legal Affairs and Human Rights Committee of the
parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe, told a press
conference in Vilnius that the human rights situation in Lithuania
is good enough for it to join the Council of Europe, Baltfax
reports.  She said that the Lithuanian authorities should ensure
the full independence of the republic's judicial system, abolish
the death penalty, improve conditions in Lithuanian prisons, and
provide better opportunities for women to take part in political
affairs. The Council of Europe plans to discuss granting its
recommendations on Lithuania's membership on 5 February 1993.
(Saulius Girnius, RFE/RL, Inc.)

[As of 1200 CET]
Compiled  by Hal Kosiba & Charles Trumbull
The RFE/RL Daily Report is produced by the RFE/RL Research
Institute (a division of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Inc.)
with the assistance of the RFE/RL News and Current Affairs
Division (NCA). The report is available by electronic mail
via LISTSERV (RFERL-L@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU), on the
Sovset' computer bulletin board, by fax, and by postal mail.

Requests for permission to reprint or retransmit this material
should be addressed to PD@RFERL.ORG. Such requests will
generally be granted on the condition that the material is
clearly attributed to the RFE/RL Daily Report. For inquiries
about specific news items, subscriptions, or additional copies,
please contact:

In USA:
Mr. Jon Lodeesen or Mr. Brian Reed
RFE/RL, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20036.
Telephone: (202) 457-6912 or -6900
fax: (202) 457-6992 or -202-828-8783;
Internet: RI-DC@RFERL.ORG

or in Europe:

Ms. Helga Hofer
Publications Department
RFE/RL Research Institute
Oettingenstrasse 67
8000 Munich 22
Telephone: (+49 89) 2102-2631 or -2642
fax: (+49 89) 2102-2648
Internet: PD@RFERL.ORG

Copyright 1992, RFE/RL, Inc. All rights reserved.
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU