Shevardnadze Pulls Back on Afghanistan : Won’t Repeat Pledge of Pullout Without Accord to End War

Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze today backed away from a pledge to withdraw the Red Army from Afghanistan even if negotiators fail to agree on conditions for ending the war there.

Entering talks with Secretary of State George P. Shultz, Shevardnadze declined to repeat the pledge for an independent pullout by a Soviet Foreign Ministry spokesman last week in Moscow after negotiations deadlocked in Geneva.

“I don’t know when he said that,” Shevardnadze said in Russian. “We shall see. It is better to have the document signed in Geneva. This is the better possibility.”

The negotiations, held under U.N. auspices between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which has provided a haven to the U.S.-backed rebels, faltered last week over a U.S. demand that the Soviets end their military aid to the Marxist government in Kabul in addition to withdrawing an estimated 120,000 troops.

Withdrawal Postponed

The Soviets announced last Tuesday they were postponing the withdrawal because of the U.S. demand and also because of Pakistani insistence that an interim government be formed in Afghanistan.

But on Thursday, Vadim Perfilyev, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, said the troops would be withdrawn independently, even if the negotiations failed to produce an agreement. Perfilyev said, however, that Soviet leaders would still prefer to remove the soldiers under terms of an international agreement.

Asked about the hard-line U.S. position on suspending military aid, Shevardnadze said, “We shall discuss this with the secretary.”

Perfilyev, who is a member of the Soviet delegation here, confirmed making the statement but added that “it was not an official statement. It was an answer to a question” from a reporter.

The Soviet spokesman said it was his “feeling” that a decision had been made to withdraw the troops. However, he said, since Shultz and Shevardnadze were discussing the issue, “it is not very necessary to operate on” what was said last week.

Communications Center Opened

In another area, Shultz and Shevardnadze today opened a new communications center to reduce the risk of nuclear war.

The ribbon-cutting ceremony in a tightly guarded room on the seventh floor of the State Department puts into effect an agreement for superpower cooperation that is in contrast to the U.S. and Soviet regional rivalries.

The Reagan Administration has supported rebels in Nicaragua and Afghanistan who are trying to topple Soviet-backed leftist governments. Shultz wants Moscow to stop its military aid, while Shevardnadze voiced “some serious concern” with U.S. policies in Central America. But they put aside their differences for today’s ceremony.

From the new center, the United States will have a satellite link to a similar center in Moscow over which full texts and graphics can be transmitted rapidly. The idea is to prevent nuclear war by miscalculation or accident. Shultz and Shevardnadze reached agreement last September on the link.