NATION

Washington Post Co. replaced the president of Newsweek magazine, the second change in key personnel at the nation’s second-largest weekly news magazine in two days. Christopher M. Little, 45, succeeds Mark M. Edminston, 43, in the top business executive post, effective immediately. Spokesman Guyon Knight said Edminston stepped down “to pursue other interests” because Post Co. President Richard D. Simmons “thought this was the right moment for a change.”

Insiders at the magazine said Edminston, who had held the president’s title since 1981, may have run afoul of Post management over cost cutting. Newsweek had made much of its cost-reduction efforts in recent years, but management apparently wants further cuts, given the current lack of advertising among weekly national magazines. Under Little, Newsweek’s senior vice president and director of administration since 1984, insiders expect another round of cutting harsher than the first.

A day earlier, Newsweek announced that it was replacing Washington Bureau Chief Morton Kondracke, 47, with Evan Thomas, an associate editor of rival Time magazine. Kondracke, who gave Newsweek coveted exposure from his appearences on various Washington television talk shows, came to the magazine in January, 1985, but insiders said he lacked administrative skills.

“He just didn’t work out,” one Newsweek editor said. Kondracke will return to the New Republic.