Soviets Deny No. 2 Man in Kremlin Stripped of Power
The ruling Politburo’s No. 2 man, Yegor Ligachev, appeared for the first time in a week at a Kremlin function Friday and a Soviet spokesman denied the hard-liner had been stripped of any of his powers.
Ligachev, attending the ceremony marking the 118th birthday of Vladimir Lenin, founder of the Soviet state, listened silently as rising Kremlin star Georgy Razumovsky attacked “conservative forces displeased” with the nation’s economic reforms, or perestroika.
Despite his appearance at the Kremlin function, a Soviet source said the 67-year-old Ligachev had lost his ideological portfolio during a special Politburo session this month because of disputes over the pace of the implementation of perestroika. The source said the decision was made by a vote in the 10-man Politburo.
‘Erroneous’ Information
Earlier, a Western diplomatic source said the conservative Ligachev had lost his portfolio and that Alexander Yakovlev, a key aide of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, was now in charge of ideology. The source said Friday he had no reason to doubt this.
But Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnaze told a news conference, “The information you have is erroneous.”
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