KREMLIN TAKES SOVIET VIEW OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN BELARUS.

Russian President Boris Yeltsin’s plenipotentiary for human rights, Oleg Mironov, considers that “the citizen is better protected in Belarus than in Russia.” In a radio interview yesterday, Mironov argued that the Belarusan state ensures employment and food supplies for its citizens. “I saw there with my own eyes that factories and collective farms have not fallen apart, but are working… and food prices are three times lower than in Russia,” Mironov said, summing up his view on human rights in Belarus. It is a vintage Soviet view, emphasizing state-provided welfare entitlements while ignoring civil and political liberties.

Looking beyond his sphere of responsibility, Mironov stressed that Russia would gain geopolitically and strategically through the projected union with Belarus. And, ultimately “we must unite the Slavic lands,” Russia’s human rights commissioner asserted, supplementing the Soviet with the pan-Slav perspective and eyeing Ukraine (Ekho Moskvy, January 5).

U.S. COMPANY TAKES OVER MAJOR GEORGIAN UTILITY.