DATE=12/13/1999
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=RUSSIA PARLIAMENT (L ONLY)
NUMBER=2-257091
BYLINE=PETER HEINLEIN
DATELINE=MOSCOW
CONTENT=

VOICED AT:

INTRO:  Russia's Communist-led Duma, or lower house of 
parliament, has turned down a request to debate the 
long-delayed START-Two arms treaty at its final 
meeting before Sunday's parliamentary elections.  /// 
OPT /// The treaty would reduce the number of 
strategic nuclear warheads held in the active 
inventories of the United States and Russia by more 
than 50 percent./// END OPT ///  But, as V-O-A's Peter 
Heinlein reports from Moscow, the lawmakers 
overwhelmingly ratified another treaty forging closer 
links with neighboring Belarus.

TEXT:  The advertised debate on START-Two proved to be 
a non-starter.  Parliamentary leaders last week 
reluctantly agreed to discuss the treaty, after 
hearing a plea from Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev. 

But the Duma's managing council Monday reversed that 
decision.  Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov told 
reporters the question had  not  been prepared, and 
was  not  ready for debate.

START-Two was signed in 1993, and ratified by the U-S 
Senate in 1996.  But it has been stalled in the Duma, 
where hardliners maintain it would damage Russia's 
security.

Monday's decision almost certainly kills any chance 
the current Duma would act on the treaty.  Elections 
for a new parliament will be held next Sunday.

Lawmakers did, however, take almost unanimous action 
on another accord, this one a union treaty with 
Belarus.  The vote was 382 in favor, three against. 

The treaty signed last week by President Boris Yeltsin 
and Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko is 
largely symbolic.  It stops far short of Mr. 
Lukashenko's stated goal of merging the two former 
Soviet republics into a single state.

///  OPT  ///   In a speech to lawmakers, (Russian) 
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin urged prompt action on 
the treaty to ensure that neither side backs away from 
eventual reunification.

///  OPT  //  PUTIN ACT - IN RUSSIAN - FADE UNDER  ///

/// OPT  ///   The Prime Minister says, "So we are 
obliged to take this step right now, before 
differences arise between us. It will be more 
difficult to unite later on."

///  OPT  ///   Only one lawmaker, Sergei Yushenkov of 
the Radical Democrats spoke out against the treaty, 
and he was chastised by the leadership for pointing 
out that the Belarussian leader continues in office 
even though his original term has expired.

///  OPT  //  YUSHENKOV ACT - IN RUSSIAN - FADE UNDER  
///

///  OPT  ///   He says, "This is  not  an agreement 
between Russia and Belarus, but between the Russian 
president and the illegitimate president of Belarus."

///  OPT  ///   He was quickly silenced by the 
Communist House Speaker Gennady Seleznyov, who said 
"Stop insulting the head of a friendly state."   ///  
END OPT  ///

Mr. Lukashenko's systematic crackdowns on political 
opponents and the independent media have made him a 
pariah in the international community.  But at home, 
he maintains solid support with his Soviet-style 
populism.

The concept of reunification remains popular in both 
Russia and Belarus, and Communist leaders suggest 
Ukraine will also eventually join.  

But Ukraine, under President Leonid Kuchma, has moved 
increasingly toward the West.  Mr. Kuchma, who won re-
election last month by a comfortable margin, said 
emphatically he does  not  want to link his country 
with any other former Soviet republics.  (Signed)

NEB/PFH/JWH/KL



13-Dec-1999 07:43 AM EDT (13-Dec-1999 1243 UTC)
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Source: Voice of America
.