Russia Resolutions

Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin and European Community officials signed a preliminary declaration Thursday pointing toward an economic and political partnership between the two former enemies. Their "joint political declaration"--in effect, an agreement to agree in the near future on the terms of enhanced trade between the two sides--puts Russia on a path that could lead to its membership in the EC. "One more Berlin Wall has fallen," Yeltsin said as he signed.

Russia and Ukraine announced Friday that their bitter three-year quarrel over how to divide the Soviet navy's smallest fleet was mostly settled and no longer stood in the way of a "strategic partnership." "I regard this event as a historic one," Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin said after a four-hour meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart, Leonid D. Kuchma, in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi. "Today we . . . have resolved this question once and for all."

Russia and Ukraine announced Friday that their bitter three-year quarrel over how to divide the Soviet navy's smallest fleet was mostly settled and no longer stood in the way of a "strategic partnership." "I regard this event as a historic one," Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin said after a four-hour meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart, Leonid D. Kuchma, in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi. "Today we . . . have resolved this question once and for all."

Arrayed at a gleaming Kremlin table that seemed to be the size of a football field, everyone who is anyone in Russia's political and social leadership turned out Thursday to sign a "civic accord" meant to give the country a two-year break from strife. "Russia is weary of torrents of mutual insults from various rostrums, of endless clashes in the media," President Boris N. Yeltsin told the gathering. "We do not want verbal wars to turn into street clashes and mass unrest."

Arrayed at a gleaming Kremlin table that seemed to be the size of a football field, everyone who is anyone in Russia's political and social leadership turned out Thursday to sign a "civic accord" meant to give the country a two-year break from strife. "Russia is weary of torrents of mutual insults from various rostrums, of endless clashes in the media," President Boris N. Yeltsin told the gathering. "We do not want verbal wars to turn into street clashes and mass unrest."

Boris N. Yeltsin, the Russian Federation's populist leader, won preliminary approval Thursday for sweeping powers that would allow him to rule the Soviet Union's largest republic by decree. Warning that Russia is sliding into chaos that the central government under President Mikhail S. Gorbachev cannot prevent, Yeltsin asked the Russian Congress of People's Deputies for emergency powers to "preserve civil peace, reestablish public order and prevent social conflicts."

President Boris N. Yeltsin will deal with the current political crisis as firmly as he resisted the 1991 hard-line Communist coup, his spokesman said. The Congress of People's Deputies has sharply curbed Yeltsin's authority and canceled his plan for a nationwide referendum on whether the president or Parliament should have supreme power. A group of 57 pro-Yeltsin deputies asked Russia's Constitutional Court to overrule Congress' actions, contending that it overstepped its authority.

Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin and European Community officials signed a preliminary declaration Thursday pointing toward an economic and political partnership between the two former enemies. Their "joint political declaration"--in effect, an agreement to agree in the near future on the terms of enhanced trade between the two sides--puts Russia on a path that could lead to its membership in the EC. "One more Berlin Wall has fallen," Yeltsin said as he signed.

President Boris N. Yeltsin will deal with the current political crisis as firmly as he resisted the 1991 hard-line Communist coup, his spokesman said. The Congress of People's Deputies has sharply curbed Yeltsin's authority and canceled his plan for a nationwide referendum on whether the president or Parliament should have supreme power. A group of 57 pro-Yeltsin deputies asked Russia's Constitutional Court to overrule Congress' actions, contending that it overstepped its authority.

Boris N. Yeltsin, the Russian Federation's populist leader, won preliminary approval Thursday for sweeping powers that would allow him to rule the Soviet Union's largest republic by decree. Warning that Russia is sliding into chaos that the central government under President Mikhail S. Gorbachev cannot prevent, Yeltsin asked the Russian Congress of People's Deputies for emergency powers to "preserve civil peace, reestablish public order and prevent social conflicts."