Andrei Gromyko
Gorbachev convened the 19th Party Conference in June 1988. He criticized leading party conservatives - Ligachev, Andrei Gromyko and Mikhail Solomentsev. In turn, conservative delegates attacked Gorbachev and the reformers. According to Brown, there had not been as much open discussion and dissent at a party meeting since the early 1920s.