Chernenko Seriously Ill, Western Diplomat Claims

President Konstantin U. Chernenko, who took power less than a year ago and has not been seen in public in a month, is seriously ill and possibly has suffered a stroke, a senior Western diplomat said today.

The diplomat said the exact nature of the 73-year-old Chernenko’s illness was not known, but he had heard reports that Chernenko had suffered a stroke or pneumonia, or possibly both.

“He is ill,” said the diplomat, who spoke on condition that he not be identified. “The Soviets I talk to say it as though they mean it and it’s serious. It’s obvious his health is declining.”

The diplomat did not say whether the Soviet leader was hospitalized.

Chernenko visibly suffers from breathing difficulties believed caused by emphysema, and he has been out of public view since he appeared on television Dec. 27 to present awards to Soviet writers.

Unlike the secrecy that surrounded the six-month illness of President Yuri Andropov, Soviet officials have admitted that Chernenko is in poor health, although they never have divulged the nature or extent of the illness.

Soviet officials said last week that Chernenko’s poor health forced postponement of his first trip abroad as leader to attend a Warsaw Pact summit scheduled Jan. 15 in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Chernenko also failed to appear at the Red Square funeral of Defense Minister Dmitri Ustinov on Dec. 24, and Western diplomats said his doctors advised him against standing in sub-zero temperatures for an extended period.

Meanwhile, the official Tass press agency said today that Moscow has chosen its delegation to upcoming arms talks with the United States and will announce the negotiators’ names in a few days.

Tass said the ruling Politburo, at its regular meeting Thursday, approved the negotiating team for the arms control talks agreed upon by Foreign Minister Andrei A. Gromyko and Secretary of State George P. Shultz earlier this month.