In this task, you're given a question, along with a context passage. The passage will not have a direct answer to the question, but can include some information and a clue for the answer. Assuming you can only obtain information about one entity in the passage, your job is to determine whether information from the passage can be used to answer the question. Indicate your choice as 'a' for Yes or 'b' for No.

Question: How many years had the Russian leader been in power when Russia recognized Baltic independence in September 1991? Passage:On 12 May 1990 the leaders of the Baltic republics signed a joint declaration known as the Baltic Entente. By mid-June the Soviets started negotiations with the Baltic republics on condition they agreed to freeze their declarations of independence. The Soviets had a bigger challenge elsewhere, in the form of the Russian Federal Republic proclaiming sovereignty in June. Simultaneously the Baltic republics also started to negotiate directly with the Russian Federal Republic. In Autumn 1990, they set up a customs border between the Baltic states, the Russian Federation and Belarus. After the failed negotiations the Soviets made a dramatic attempt to break the deadlock and sent troops to Lithuania and Latvia in January 1991. The attempts failed, dozens of civilians were killed, and the Soviet troops decided to retreat. In August 1991, the hard-line members of the Soviet government attempted to take control of the Soviet Union. One day after the coup on 21 August, the Estonians proclaimed independence. Shortly afterwards Soviet paratroops seized the Tallinn television tower. The Latvian parliament made similar a declaration at the same day. The coup failed but the Collapse of the Soviet Union became unavoidable. On 28 August, the European Community welcomed the restoration of the sovereignty and independence of the Baltic states. The Soviet Union recognised the Baltic independence on 6 September 1991. The Russian troops stayed for an additional three years, as Boris Yeltsin linked the issue of Russian minorities with troop withdrawals. Lithuania was the first to have the Russian troops withdrawn from its territory in August 1993. On 26 July 1994 Russian troops withdrew from Estonia and on 31 August 1994, Russian troops withdrew from Latvia. The Russian Federation ended its military presence in Estonia after it relinquished control of the nuclear facilities in Paldiski on 26 September 1995 and in Latvia after Skrunda-1 suspended operations on 31 August 1998 and subsequently dismantled. The last Russian soldier left Skrunda-1 in October 1999, thus marking a symbolic end to the Russian military presence on the soil of the Baltic countries.

b

Question: How many countries border the body of water on the coast of which Hommaire coordinated the construction of a lighthouse? Passage:After attending school in Altkirch and Dijon, Hommaire graduated as an engineer at the Ecole des Mines in Saint-Etienne in 1833. There he met Adele Heriot whom he married in 1834. In October 1835, he went Turkey where he coordinated the construction of a suspension bridge in Constantinople and a lighthouse on the Black Sea coast. In 1838, he arrived in southern Russia where he performed ethnographical research and geographical surveys. After he discovered coal resources along the Dnieper River, Czar Nicholas I awarded him the St Vladimir Cross. In 1842, while working on mining and road-building projects in Moldavia, he fell ill and returned to France. The following year he became a member of the Societe de Geographie and the Societe geologique and published a number of scientific papers. In 1844 the Societe de Geographie awarded him their Gold Medal .

b

Question: Who piloted the airplane that killed Mulgrew Nunatak in 1979? Passage:Mulgrew Nunatak () is a prominent nunatak, 1,600 m, standing four nautical miles (7km) east of Tentacle Ridge in the Cook Mountains. Its summit, standing at , is named Peter Crest. The nunatak was first mapped by the Darwin Glacier Party of the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition (195658). Both it and its peak were named for Peter D. Mulgrew, a New Zealand adventurer who accompanied Sir Edmund Hillary to the South Pole and served as the chief radio operator at Scott Base. He perished in the Air New Zealand DC10 scenic flight to Ross Island, 28 November 1979, when the airplane crashed near Te Puna Roimata Peak ("spring of tears" peak) on the northeast slope of Mount Erebus, killing all 257 persons aboard.
a