Word: yeltsin
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What Stepashin does, and does very well, is protect Yeltsin. And his appointment more than anything is a sign that Yeltsin has now morphed from a man who wanted to change Russia into a man who simply wants to hold on to power. As his nation starves, Yeltsin reached not for an economist or a diplomat who might be able to help Russians figure a way forward. Instead he called on a security man. After its humiliation over the impeachment, the Duma may decide to save face by rejecting Stepashin. But it may be hard for them to summon...
...with the approach of the year 2000 and the end of his second term, Yeltsin has become a prisoner of his own nightmares--that he and his family will be persecuted or prosecuted by political enemies once he leaves office, that the sort of slights and humiliations he has inflicted on others will be visited upon him. He has plenty to fear. The sight of deputies accusing an incumbent President of high treason is a worrying reminder of how bad things could be for him when he leaves office. And impeachment was not his first nasty fright. Just two months...
Primakov was certainly not a perfect Prime Minister, and it was easy for Yeltsin to find a reason to dismiss him. Officially his crime was nonfeasance: the failure to drag Russia from its spiraling depression. In the days before his dismissal, Yeltsin aides began to prepare for the change by depicting Primakov as a man suffering from lockjaw on the crucial economic issues Russia now faces. But there was also worry inside Yeltsin's circle that the Prime Minister was suffering from a more pernicious disease: ambition. While he had studiously denied any interest in running for President...
Primakov himself departed office with a joke and affectionate applause from his Cabinet. But he could afford to smile: by firing him, Russians say, Yeltsin boosted Primakov's chances of being the next President. Aides say Primakov has not yet made up his mind about the future. Yeltsin, however, does not have the luxury of choice. He has to keep fighting, and that is becoming ever harder for him. Despite claims, more often heard in Washington than in Moscow, that "Boris is back" in the driver's seat, his physical health and mental lucidity are often open to question. After...
...Boris Yeltsin who occupies the Kremlin hardly resembles the man who emerged as the country's preeminent leader in 1991, when he faced down a communist coup aimed at rolling back reform. Then he was Russia's first real politician, and his thick hair and fast smile seemed to evoke a future that made Russians dreamy with hope. But Yeltsin today is an all too familiar Russian archetype. Reclusive and suspicious, the President lives in a tightly sealed world. Most presidential meetings are rigid and formal. Senior Cabinet ministers and aides have an old-fashioned phone next to their desks...