RUSSIANS MAY CARVE OUT AUTONOMOUS AREAS, MOSCOW WARNS.

Abdullah Mikitayev, chairman of Russia’s commission on citizenship matters attached to the office of President Boris Yeltsin, warned yesterday in a statement for Baltic media that Russians may organize autonomous enclaves in Estonia and Latvia. Mikitayev justified autonomy as "quite natural" on the grounds that ethnic Russians and "Russian-speakers" must be considered indigenous to the Baltic countries and are being "deprived of civic rights," including dual citizenship. Mikitayev said that he was speaking in the wake of a meeting of officials concerned with those issues in the Yeltsin administration, at which "cardinal solutions" were discussed. (10) In common with other Russian officials, Mikitayev wants dual citizenship and autonomy rights for Soviet-era settlers while insisting that Estonia and Latvia are "their homeland." He also claims a right for Moscow to represent the global category of "Russian-speakers," currently amounting to more than 40 percent of Estonia’s and Latvia’s population as a consequence of Soviet-period migration processes.

Yeltsin Confirms Russia-Belarus Confederation Plan.