RUSSIAN BORDER FORCES CHIEF HOLDS TALKS IN ALMATY.

The commander of Russia’s Federal Border Service, Gen. Andrei Nikolaev, conferred in Almaty on September 28-29 with Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbaev, defense minister Col. Gen. Muhtar Altynbaev, and border troops commander Toktasyn Buzubaev. The sides continued to disagree regarding the deployment of Cossack detachments as auxiliaries to Russian border troops on the border with Kazakhstan. In addition, Nazarbaev obtained only a vague promise that Russia will cooperate with Kazakhstan in "gradually beginning" the work of border delimitation and in "preparing and signing at a future time" a border treaty. Nazarbaev pointed to Kazakhstan’s border agreements with China as an example for Russia to follow.

The sides agreed to extend until December 31, 1997, an agreement on the legal status and the supply of the Kazakh battalion that serves with Russian border troops in Tajikistan. (Russian agencies, September 29)

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