A commission set up by Russia's parliament and government to resolve differences about the 1996 budget agreed on a new inflation forecast on Monday, removing a major stumbling block to approving a budget for next year. The reconciliation commission voted to base the 1996 budget... MORE

According to initial reports, at least 300 people died in a fire in Baku's subway October 28. Two days of national morning have been declared. President Haydar Aliev has appointed a commission to investigate. Leading Opposition Parties Banned From Election

. Interfax today quoted a senior aide to President Boris Yeltsin as saying that the Russian leader's health had not deteriorated over the last 24 hours, but he would not yet receive visitors. Yavlinsky Sees Conspiracy

. The head of a big reformist party barred from taking part in Russia's general election said today that Kremlin hawks in President Boris Yeltsin's camp were trying to sabotage his challenge for the presidency. Yavlinsky said he would appeal to the Supreme Court on... MORE

Leonid Kuchma and Brazilian president Fernando Henrique Cardoso signed a friendship and cooperation treaty on October 26 in Brasilia. Other basic agreements resulting from Kuchma's official visit covered diplomatic traffic and trade relations. Among other items, Ukraine is particularly anxious to sell rocket-launchers to Brazil.... MORE

Lithuanian prime minister Adolfas Slezevicius told a Vilnius briefing yesterday that according to the latest assurances from his Latvian counterpart Maris Gailis, licenses which the Latvian government is about to award to Amoco and OPAB oil companies for prospecting the disputed offshore area would not... MORE

General Helge Hansen, Commander of NATO's Central Front Forces in Europe, said in Minsk on October 26 that Belarus is preparing a detailed plan for cooperation with NATO within the framework of the Partnership for Peace. Hansen had just completed talks with Belarus's newly appointed... MORE

Russia's Federation Council and Duma have each forwarded to the Prosecutor General's Office and to the Defense Ministry a request to investigate and explain the October 24 airborne raid on Ingushestia's Sleptsovskaya airport (see the October 25 Monitor). Addressing the Federation Council, Ingush president Ruslan... MORE

Russian foreign ministry officials announced yesterday that the OSCE mission chief in Chechnya, Sandor Meszaros, has been hospitalized in his country, Hungary, for treatment of injuries sustained in a traffic accident in Grozny earlier this month, and would probably not return. Meszaros's departure from Grozny... MORE

A large part of the long-dead Supreme Soviet of the former Chechen-Ingush ASSR convened in Grozny October 24 and elected a new chairman, Amin Osmayev, formally releasing Doku Zavgayev from that post. The Moscow-selected National Accord Committee named Zavgayev prime minister of a would-be government,... MORE