“PROGRESS WITHOUT SHOCKS.”

At the constituent congress of the “Russia is OurHome” electoral bloc, Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin promised thatreforms would continue, but without the shocks of the past. Perhapssignificantly, however, he did not call for the extension of the moratoriumon fighting in Chechnya as at least one paper–Nezavisimaya gazeta–hadpredicted. Chernomyrdin did say, however, that his block would concentrate onthe single-member constituencies, an implicit concession that his group haslittle ideological unity. The meeting, which attracted 308 delegates and morethan 200 guests but not Yeltsin himself, was widely covered in the press.Moreover, the bloc reportedly has raised enormous sums of money from privatefirms and banks, contributions that have sparked demands for an investigationby some Russian parliamentarians. The “party of power” nonetheless has itsdetractors: foreign minister Andrei Kozyrev and reformer Yegor Gaidar haveeach said that they will not join.

Lebed Refuses To Resign.