Page 6
The Battalion
Wednesday, July 3,1991
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Soviets
MOSCOW (AP) — At first the
Soviets denied it. Then they ad
mitted a small problem might ex
ist. And on Monday, more than
60 years after Stalin decreed that
joblessness had ceased to exist,
unemployment offices opened
across the Russian Federation.
The Kremlin has plans for sim
ilar centers nationwide to help
workers find jobs and survive in
a central economy bordering on
collapse.
The Russian legislature has set
up "Labor Exchanges" for the
140 million residents of their vast
republic, the largest and richest
in the Soviet Union.
Workers in Russia will be eligi
ble to receive jobless compensa
tion of 160 rubles a month com-
Shevardnadze
urges unity,
democracy
in platform
MOSCOW (AP) — Former
Foreign Minister Eduard A. She
vardnadze and other prominent
reformers on Tuesday urged
pro-democracy forces to unite
and wipe out the "threat of dicta
torship."
"The main task that we are fac
ing is to save democracy," She
vardnadze told a news confer
ence where reformers released a
platform for a nationwide politi
cal organization they hope to
form in September.
Shevardnadze's group of nine
Communists and ex-Commu-
nists hopes to force the Commu
nist Party to expel hard-liners
who want to return to one-party
rule, said group member Arkady
Volsky.
The showdown between re
formers and hard-liners will
come at a Communist Party Cen
tral Committee meeting this
month, said Volsky, an ally and
one-time aide to President Mik
hail S. Gorbachev.
He did not indicate whether
the meeting would be before or
after Gorbachev meets in Lon
don on July 17 with leaders of
the Group of Seven industri
alized nations.
"The opposition is very
strong," Volsky said. If the meet
ing ends with a Communist
Party committed to democracy,
it could then affiliate with or
merge into Shevardnadze's pro
democracy coalition, Volsky
said.
Shevardnadze had said earlier
that he saw a need to "create a
democratic party that would act
parallel with" the Communist
Party.
"There can be no state of law
without a solid, serious, con
structive opposition," he said
last month.
Another key member of the
group, former Politburo member
Alexander Yakovlev, on Tues
day urged the coalition to "ab
sorb everyone who takes as his
goal the real renewal of society
... on the rails of democracy."
admit unemployment
pared to the average monthly
salary of about 350 rubles a
month, the state news agency
Tass reported.
Private jobless offices have
been operating in the capital for
months. But none run by the re
publics or the national govern
ment has existed until now in a
nation where the unemployed
can still be arrested as "parasi
tes."
In the era of reform introduced
by President Mikhail S. Gorba
chev, unemployment figures fi
nally have been revealed for
some parts of the Soviet econ
omy.
The Soviet State Statistics.
Committee disclosed in January
that nearly 25 million people
were out of work in all of 1990 in
the country of 289 million.
Figures released by the United
Nations were much lower. A
U.N. report said that at the end
of last year almost 1.4 percent of
the Soviet labor force, or 2 mil
lion people, were unemployed.
That unemployment is ac
knowledged at all is a change.
Dictator Josef Stalin declared in
October 1930 that unemploy
ment was a symptom of capital
ism and no longer existed in the
Soviet Union.
He abolished the Labor Com
missariat and shuttered labor ex
changes set up under the Bolshe
viks. They were replaced by job
placement offices that assigned
people jobs.
Unemployment was made a
crime and jobless people ar
rested for "parasitism."
The government denied there
was any unemployment and
guaranteed a job for everybody,
enshrining the promise in its
1977 constitution. The law led to
bloated staffs, low pay and vir
tually no layoffs or firings.
Western experts had esti
mated a low Soviet unemploy
ment rate during the 1970s and
80s but a larger problem of over
employment: factories and busi
nesses had more workers than
needed. Under Gorbachev, offi
cials admitted the problems and
let businesses lay off workers in
order to become self-sustaining.
After 22 years of selling home-grown watermelons on from his business next year. Ben sets up his truck on
the roadsides of College Station, Ben said he will retire Highway 6 at the entrance of Easterwood Airport.
Prisoner swap
Arab-Israeli trade
may spur releases
of other hostages
JERUSALEM (AP) — An Is
raeli-sponsored Lebanese militia
said Monday it was ready to
swap hundreds of Arab prison
ers for Israelis missing in Leb
anon, a move that could spur the
release of Western hostages.
The offer by Gen. Antoine
Lahd, commander of the South
Lebanon Army militia, came af
ter a weekend of renewed diplo
matic efforts by the United States
to end the hostage crisis.
Shiite Muslim leaders have de
manded freedom for Lebanese
Shiites and Palestinians held by
the SLA in exchange for Western
hostages. Israel says an ex
change also must involve its
seven troops missing in Lebanon
since 1982.
Israel army radio quoted Lahd
as saying he was "ready to trade
the hundreds of Palestinians and
Shiite prisoners." An estimated
300 to 400 inmates are held by
his militia at the A1 Khiam prison
in southern Lebanon.
Reached by telephone, Lahd
told The Associated Press: "Yes,
it's true what they reported on
the radio." But he declined to
elaborate.
The radio did not mention the
Western hostages, but said Lahd
insisted that a swap include all
missing Israeli soldiers and his
own militiamen held by various
groups. The radio also quoted
him as saying he had no official
request to free prisoners.
There are 13 Westerners miss
ing in Lebanon, most of them
held by Shiite Muslim militants.
They are six Americans, four
Britons, two Germans and an
Italian. The longest held is
American Terry Anderson, chief
Middle East correspondent for
The Associated Press. He was
kidnapped March 16, 1985.
The reported offer by Lahd
came as 6,000 Lebanese army
troops backed by tanks moved
into south Lebanon and began
encircling Palestinian guerrilla
bases in a bid to restore govern
ment authority to the region.
Bush to meet Gorbachev
at western economic talks,
hopes for Moscow summit
KENNEBUNKPORT, Maine (AP) — President Bush said Mon
day he would meet Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev in Lon
don for lunch during the western economic summit and hoped to
stir progress on strategic arms talks.
He said a Moscow summit this month with Gorbachev was still
possible.
Bush said he also was looking forward to the two-hour lunch,
to be held on July 17, the final day of the western economic sum
mit, to hear Gorbachev's assessment of Soviet economic reforms.
The Bush-Gorbachev session will come just before the Soviet
leader makes a direct appeal to the United States and its major eco
nomic partners for economic aid. Bush rejected the notion that the
meeting would be a failure for Gorbachev if he leaves without ma
jor commitments.
"I'll be resisting it if people say that," Bush said. "We've got an
awful lot of consultation before concrete economic programs can be
agreed to."
The president said the one-on-one meeting did not reduce the
urgency of staging a summit with the Soviet leader and said it was
still possible that he would travel to Moscow by the end of the
month for longer talks.
"I think we can't do it in just a luncheon, but my respect for him
is such that I find, when we can sit down and talk over a reasona
ble period of time, you can get into a lot of subjects," Bush said.
The administration has at times wavered over whether having a
strategic arms treaty ready for the leaders to sign is a requirement
for a summit.
A White House official, who asked to remain anonymous, said
Monday that an arms agreement was a requirement. "It will first be
necessary to resolve the outstanding differences ... so a treaty will
be ready for signing in Moscow," the official said.
Bush told reporters another goal of any summit meeting with
Gorbachev would be an effort to erase lingering mistrust of the
United States by hardliners in the Soviet military.