. A prominent rabbi said in Moscow May 26 that the Russian government may be retreating from what had seemed earlier to be a decision to shut down the leading Jewish emigration organization in Russia. (See Monitor, May 2 & 17) Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt was... MORE

Over 2.7 million people have migrated to Russia from the other former Soviet republics in the past three years, more than a million of them refugees and internally displaced persons, according to Tatyana Regent, head of Russia's Federal Migration Service. The majority are ethnic Russians.... MORE

Russian foreign minister Yevgeny Primakov wound up a three-nation Latin American visit in Venezuela May 26. He had earlier held talks in Mexico and Cuba. In Caracas May 24, Primakov and his Venezuelan counterpart signed an interstate cooperation agreement and an intergovernmental agreement on cultural... MORE

The Congress of Russian Communities, meeting in Moscow over the weekend, decided to turn itself into a political party to support Aleksandr Lebed's election campaign. (Itar-Tass, May 26) The party is to be called the Russian Popular Party. One of its leaders, Sergei Glazyev, designated... MORE

Gennady Zyuganov, leader of the Communist and nationalist coalition in the Russian presidential elections, yesterday unveiled his long-awaited economic program. (Interfax, Itar-Tass, May 27; Financial Times, May 28) The 20-page program, called "From Destruction to Creation -- Russia's Path into the Twenty-first Century," covers the... MORE

Yabloko leader and presidential candidate Grigory Yavlinsky says he will not withdraw from the presidential campaign in favor of President Boris Yeltsin and will never accept a post in a Yeltsin government. Earlier, Yavlinsky had indicated that he would consider a coalition if Yeltsin sacked... MORE

Russia's hawkish defense minister did an about-face on peace talks with Chechnya over the weekend, contradicting President Boris Yeltsin May 25 on their prospects for success and then hailing the talks two days later as a "constructive step" toward the cessation of hostilities. Grachev, whose... MORE

President Leonid Kuchma today appointed Pavlo Lazarenko as prime minister, in place of Yevhen Marchuk whom Kuchma fired yesterday. Lazarenko, 43 and a native like Kuchma of Dnepropetrovsk oblast, is a close political ally of the president. He has until now served as first deputy... MORE

Bella Denisenko, co-chair of the party Russia's Democratic Choice, said that, if Yeltsin is reelected for a second term, he should disband the present Communist-dominated Duma and call fresh parliamentary elections. Should Yeltsin be defeated "as a result of his opponents' falsifying the election returns,"... MORE

Bonn and Moscow signed an agreement May 24 on a German loan to Russia of $650 million. The seven-year credit is to be used, among other things, to upgrade a metallurgy plant and to build plants that will produce school furniture, medication, and sugar. (AP,... MORE