NATIONALISTS SPLIT.

Amid all the talk about the possibility of a coalition government with Communist participation, a split has appeared within the ranks of the nationalists who make up the Communists’ closest parliamentary allies. One hard-line member of the Popular Power parliamentary faction has already quit the faction. Further defections may follow. Radical members are up in arms over the decision by former Soviet Prime Minister Nikolai Ryzhkov and other faction leaders to vote in support of the government’s draft budget when it received its third reading last week. (NTV, February 6) "One thing is clear," Russian television commented. "The left wing of the deputies’ corps no longer looks as monolithic as it used to." (RTR, January 6)

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