Yeltsin Flails His Own Reform Team

MOSCOW — In a transparent ploy to appease his opposition and improve his popularity, Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin took verbal punches at members of his own economic reform team before legislators Tuesday but stressed that, despite the mistakes, Russia is moving in the right direction.

He also indicated he is abandoning Russia’s noninterventionist policy toward other former Soviet republics, saying he is taking control of a railway and Black Sea coastline in Abkhazia, a region of the former Soviet republic of Georgia where Georgians and Abkhazians are locked in warfare.

Yeltsin’s speech sounded like the pre-election politicking of an unpopular incumbent as he touched on numerous problems facing Russia. But he also highlighted the achievements of the first 10 months of economic reform and said that the government, led by acting Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar, should not be replaced.

“Russia has set off down the road to a new life,” Yeltsin told the conservative Supreme Soviet, the legislature. “We are beginning to resemble a society whose economy is driven not by command but by the laws of the market.”

At least 10% of Russia’s 145 million people, he said, already work in the private sector, up from none five years ago. But Yeltsin said that in striving for success, members of the government that he appointed have ignored the painful effects of their policies on ordinary people and the enterprises where they work.

In a direct blow at Gaidar--the young architect of Russia’s economic reforms who has become the punching bag for the president’s opponents--Yeltsin said: “Our economic policy has been filled with too much macroeconomics to the detriment of specific human and industrial problems. . . .” He also accused Gaidar of being too skeptical of reforms suggested by other political groups.

Yeltsin appeared to be trying to distance himself from Gaidar in hopes of boosting his own popularity, which is essential to preventing the people from abandoning the hard road toward a free-market economy.

Yeltsin also said he is “deeply dissatisfied with” Pyotr Aven, foreign economic relations minister, for failing to protect Russian interests and allowing the country’s hard currency funds to dwindle. Economics Minister Andrei Nechayev and Industry Minister Alexander Titkin were also criticized by name.

Liberal lawmakers said they were discouraged by Yeltsin’s harsh public scolding of his team and his apparent willingness to bend his policies to please conservatives who want to put the brakes on the transition to a free-market economy.

“I am very much troubled by the fact that (Yeltsin) makes such significant concessions to our right-wingers,” said Sergei N. Yushenkov, leader of the Radical Democrats faction in the legislature.

Conservatives said Yeltsin’s speech sounded good but they doubt that he will come through with concessions.

In his 50-minute address, Yeltsin tried to appeal to almost every sector of Russia’s reform-weary population.

He called for renewed privileges for war veterans, invalids and pensioners. To appease one of the country’s most powerful political forces--directors of state-owned factories--he promised tax breaks for industrial enterprises. To farmers he offered more rigorous land reform.

Discussing the violence in Abkhazia, Yeltsin said the crisis has become “one of the major factors of instability in the region.” Although Russia has pursued a policy of not interfering in violent conflicts raging in other former Soviet republics, Yeltsin told legislators he was compelled to take firm measures in Abkhazia. “We are assuming full control of the railway and adjoining coastline from the Russian border with Abkhazia to the Abkhazian border with Georgia,” he said. “But we are not taking part in direct military operations.”