Soviet Propaganda Chief Meets Press but Glasnost Is Out of Sight

Alexander N. Yakovlev, a member of the ruling Politburo, talks a lot about glasnost , the official policy of public openness, but he displayed very little of it Tuesday at a rare meeting with the press.

Yakovlev, who is head of the propaganda department of the Communist Party Central Committee, defended the secret nature of Communist Party meetings and fended off questions on a variety of other subjects.

Although he holds a doctorate in history, Yakovlev scorned as “rumors” the findings of most Western historians that millions of people died during Josef Stalin’s terror and forced collectivization in the 1930s.

Although resistant to most questions, he showed flashes of humor and ended the 90-minute meeting by declaring that Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev “firmly intends to improve relations with the United States . . . for the sake of the world.”

‘Published Already’

When a British reporter asked whether the Soviet government plans to publish Nikita S. Khrushchev’s famous “secret speech” of 1956, in which he exposed the crimes of Stalin, Yakovlev replied, with a smile:

“You shouldn’t worry about it. You’ve got it published already.”

Other reporters asked him what had led Boris N. Yeltsin to offer to resign as head of the party in Moscow. The offer was reported to have been made at a recent meeting of the Central Committee, and there has been speculation that Yeltsin had gone too far in his outspoken criticism of those who resist change in the Soviet Union.

Yakovlev chided the reporters for asking and said that Western press reports about the incident were “mild fantasy.”

“We are not duty-bound to talk about our party affairs,” he said. “I know what happens in your parliaments. . . . (As a party member), you have no right to talk openly about these problems and share it with the whole world.”

However, Yeltsin’s offer to resign was confirmed by party secretary Anatoly I. Lukyanov, who was present at the meeting.

A reporter asked Yakovlev why Tass, the official Soviet news agency, had warned Soviet newspapers not to use Lukyanov’s information on Yeltsin, suggesting that there is a double standard for Soviet and foreign publications.

But instead of answering the question, Yakovlev shot back: “Why do you use our internal Tass statements? We don’t use yours.”

As for Gorbachev’s refusal, at a meeting last month with Secretary of State George P. Shultz, to set a date for his planned meeting with President Reagan, then setting a date less than a week later, Yakovlev denied there was any refusal at the first meeting.

“There was no talk of going or not going,” he said. “Our stand on this was quite clear.”

In response to a question about why Gorbachev, in a speech Monday on the 70th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution, had spoken about “many thousands” in reference to the number of victims of Stalin’s terror, instead of the “many millions” used by Western historians, he said:

“Why do you think that if he said millions, that would have been more accurate than thousands?” Yakovlev snapped. “I know the rumors in the West. . . . I think many of these rumors lie on the conscience of certain people.”

He said a recent article in a Soviet magazine about the disappearance of high-ranking military officers after Stalin’s purge of the high command might have implied falsely that they were all executed.

“Some died,” he said, “some retired, some were transferred, some were promoted. . . . You should not take these figures at face value.”

Earlier, in response to another question about Gorbachev’s references to Stalin’s crimes, Yakovlev had said:

“So far as I understand, Gorbachev was not engaged in statistics.”

When an American reporter suggested that the Soviet press is being less polemical these days about the United States, Yakovlev quipped: “Apparently we’re busy with our own problems. Thank you for reminding me.”

Yakovlev, who was the Soviet ambassador to Canada for nearly a decade and spent the academic year of 1959 as an exchange student at Columbia University, drew a standing-room-only crowd at the Foreign Press Center. In addition to reporters, there were many diplomats on hand and such senior officials as Gennady I. Gerasimov, the Foreign Ministry spokesman.

Members of the Politburo rarely grant interviews with the press or present themselves for press conferences. Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze met recently with reporters, but the questioning then was limited to his meeting with American officials.

Yakovlev has been a leading party propagandist for more than 20 years, but he was not named to the Central Committee until 1985. Less than a year later, he was named a candidate member of the Politburo, then elevated to full membership this year.