Police Latvia

Hundreds of pro-Kremlin Latvian police officers jeered the republic's president Monday, reflecting the deep division in local law enforcement ranks over the issue of independence.

Many of them had patrolled together for years as Latvia's "boys in blue," but two weeks ago they fired Kalashnikov automatic rifles at one another in a fierce 90-minute gun battle in central Riga. Troops from the "black berets" sprayed the headquarters of the Latvian Interior Ministry and surrounding areas with rounds of automatic weapon fire, took over the building and shot dead two policemen.

Many of them had patrolled together for years as Latvia's "boys in blue," but two weeks ago they fired Kalashnikov automatic rifles at one another in a fierce 90-minute gun battle in central Riga. Troops from the "black berets" sprayed the headquarters of the Latvian Interior Ministry and surrounding areas with rounds of automatic weapon fire, took over the building and shot dead two policemen.

Hundreds of pro-Kremlin Latvian police officers jeered the republic's president Monday, reflecting the deep division in local law enforcement ranks over the issue of independence.

President Mikhail S. Gorbachev today nominated veteran diplomat Alexander Bessmertnykh, the Soviet ambassador to Washington, to become his new foreign minister. The Supreme Soviet later voted 421 to 3 to approve the president's choice. Bessmertnykh replaces longtime Gorbachev ally Eduard A. Shevardnadze, who announced his resignation Dec. 20 to protest what he said was the president's drift toward dictatorship under the influence of hard-liners.

After two years of rocky negotiations, the presidents of Russia and Latvia agreed Saturday on an Aug. 31 deadline for withdrawal of Russia's troops from the Baltic nation. The treaty, subject to ratification by both parliaments, allows the Russian army to operate its early warning radar station in the Latvian town of Skrunda for four more years. It will have 18 months after that to dismantle the facility, an integral part of Russia's air defense system.

The Supreme Court, in a setback for civil rights forces, refused Monday to bar officials from dismantling a 15-year-old cross-town busing program used to desegregate public elementary schools in Norfolk, Va. The court turned down an emergency plea from a group of black parents for an injunction that would require busing to continue next fall, until the justices act on their appeal of a lower court ruling approving a new plan that assigns students to the schools nearest their homes.