RUSSIAN DUMA REJECTS DRAFT BUDGET.

As had been expected, the lower house of the Russian parliament, the Duma, yesterday rejected the government’s draft 1998 federal budget in the first reading. In a gesture of moderation, the Duma rejected by 134 to 78 a proposal by the Popular Power faction that the budget should be rejected out of hand and returned to the government. Similarly, the Duma voted 210-52 against the proposal of the Yabloko faction that parliament should hold an immediate vote of no confidence in the government. Instead, the Duma accepted the Communist faction’s proposal that the budget be referred for reworking to a trilateral conciliation commission made up of representatives of the government and the two houses of parliament. Voting was 326-13 with one abstention. First Deputy Prime Minister Anatoly Chubais called the vote "a victory for common sense." President Yeltsin said he was confident "everything will be all right" and he would not have "to use the rights given to him by the constitution" to dissolve parliament. (RTR, ORT, October 9)

However, Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov reiterated his faction’s intention to press for a vote of no-confidence in the government next week. Yabloko leader Grigory Yavlinsky called Zyuganov’s position nonsensical: if the Communists expected to have no confidence in the government next week, they should have supported Yabloko’s motion for an immediate no-confidence vote this week, he said.

Communist Party Courts Regional Governors.