LEBED’S POLITICAL MOVEMENT GROWS.

According to Yuri Shevtsov, a leader of the "Honor and Motherland" movement set up by Aleksandr Lebed in October 1995, the movement now has 80,000 registered members and branches in 72 of Russia’s 89 regions. The movement originally united officers — active and retired — who were opposed to policies enacted by former defense minister Pavel Grachev. But now, in addition to the officers and members of their families, the movement’s membership has been swelled by an inflow of employees from the military-industrial complex and major industrial enterprises. The movement is to hold a congress in December at which it will decide whether or not to turn itself into a political party. Leaders of the movement have begun to doubt the usefulness of continuing their alliance with Sergei Glazyev’s Democratic party and Dmitri Rogozin’s Congress of Russian Communities, and may decide to cut the ties that have kept the groups together until now. (Nezavisimaya gazeta, November 13)

Tax Revenues Increase.