PRESIDENTIAL OFFICIAL THREATENS ECONOMIC SANCTIONS ON BALTS.

Abdulakh Mikitayev, chief of Yeltsin’s citizenship office, said Moscow could use economic sanctions against the Baltic states to defend the rights of ethnic Russians living in the Baltic states and elsewhere abroad, Segodnya reported June 8. Speaking at a special conference on this issue, Mikitayev said that Yeltsin plans to establish a special international commission in his office to consider such steps. Russian radio reported June 7 that this conference had been told that some 500,000 Russians living abroad had claimed Russian citizenship since the end of the USSR. It did not say how many of these people were still living in the 14 non-Russian republics.

Earthquake Toll Rises to 1825.