Panel of Soviet Legislature to Question Baker

In another dramatic symbol of the armistice in the Cold War, Secretary of State James A. Baker III will appear before a Soviet parliamentary committee to answer questions next week when he visits Moscow, it was announced Friday.

The unprecedented appearance by an American secretary of state in the witness chair of the International Affairs Committee of the Supreme Soviet parallels the visit last year of Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze to the headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in Brussels.

“We are living in a time where a lot of things that haven’t been done before are being done, and this is certainly one of them,” State Department spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler said.

Baker is scheduled to hold detailed discussions with Shevardnadze on Thursday and Friday in Moscow and is expected to meet Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev on Friday. Such talks have become commonplace features of superpower diplomacy, in times of tension as well as times of detente. But Baker agreed to remain in Moscow next Saturday to talk to the members of Parliament.

“The Soviet legislature is acquiring increasing significance in Soviet political life,” Tutwiler said. “It is also likely to play an increasingly important role in shaping Soviet foreign policy. Secretary Baker’s meeting provides an excellent opportunity to deepen our own understanding of the thinking of Soviet legislators most concerned with foreign affairs as well as answer their questions about U.S. foreign policy.”

Tutwiler said there were no immediate plans for Shevardnadze to pay a return visit to the foreign policy committees of the Senate or House of Representatives. In recent months, however, lower-ranking Soviet officials have been witnesses on Capitol Hill.

Baker is scheduled to leave Washington on Monday. On the way to Moscow, he plans to stop in Prague on Tuesday and Wednesday for a visit intended to dramatize U.S. support for Czechoslovakia’s democratic reforms.

Baker’s talks with Shevardnadze are intended to set the agenda for President Bush’s summit meeting with Gorbachev, scheduled for June in Washington.