Soviet Loyalists Try to Silence Lithuanian Press : Secession: But the printing plant director vows to continue publishing the offending newspapers.

Soviet loyalists on Monday tried to muzzle the beleaguered Lithuanian government by barring publication of “anti-Soviet” newspapers at the republic’s main printing press, but the plant director, supported by printers, vowed to continue publication.

Responding to Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s weekend demands that they rescind their decision to secede or risk “grave consequences,” Lithuanian lawmakers also dispatched envoys to Moscow and invited Gorbachev to send a representative to Vilnius, their capital.

Although reiterating his longstanding desire for talks with the Kremlin, the Baltic republic’s president said there could be no backtracking on his Parliament’s vote for independence last month.

“That 124 people elected to do one thing will turn around after three weeks and do something else--I don’t understand how one imagines that this could be so,” Vytautas Landsbergis said in a speech to the Supreme Council, the Parliament. “We are honorable people.”

However, Landsbergis did signal his readiness to compromise by saying that his breakaway government is seeking gradual--and not total and immediate--independence from Moscow.

As many as 60 armored vehicles as well as support vehicles were reported to have been brought to Vilnius on Sunday in what appeared to be a significant military buildup and the latest maneuver in Moscow’s war of nerves with the Landsbergis leadership.

In a move designed to further sap the influence of the Lithuanian government, a Communist Party official loyal to Moscow, Juozas Kuolelis, told a meeting of newspaper executives in Vilnius that the party’s main publishing house will no longer print the Lithuanian government’s newspapers or publications that are deemed “anti-Soviet” or anti-socialist.

“This will be the end of glasnost in Lithuania,” said Linas Medelis, an editor at Atgimimas (Rebirth), a 100,000-circulation weekly printed by Sajudis, the national movement headed by Landsbergis that waged a two-year campaign for the restoration of the independence Lithuania enjoyed between the world wars.

Also refused future publication rights at the Central Committee Typography and Publishing House were the Russian-language government daily Ekho Litvy (Echo of Lithuania), which has a circulation of about 60,000, and the 250,000-circulation Lithuanian-language daily Tiesa (Truth), which was a party organ until declaring itself independent last month.

“It’s not censorship, but this printing house has a virtual monopoly,” Medelis said. “If they close it, they effectively shut down our capability to print.”

Kuolelis’ action showed that pro-Moscow Communists in Lithuania are continuing to claim party property as theirs, although their faction is dwarfed in membership by the independent Lithuanian Communist Party formed in December. Soviet paratroopers have already occupied some party buildings on orders from pro-Moscow party officials.

A. Pevorunas, director of the press, said he will continue printing the same newspapers as before, the Lithuanian Information Bureau reported. Some printers also said they would refuse to set type for Sovietskaya Litva (Soviet Lithuania), a newspaper created to advocate continued membership in the Soviet Union. The paper is printed in Minsk, the capital of the neighboring republic of Byelorussia.

Soldiers from the Soviet Interior Ministry were at the plant on the outskirts of Vilnius when Kuolelis spoke, but they made no move. Since Kuolelis said Moscow loyalists would not use force to impose their will, it was unclear how personnel could be compelled to obey them.

Deputy Prime Minister Romualdas Ozolas, the leader of the three Lithuanian negotiators, said before he flew to Moscow that “we will discuss everything under the conditions Gorbachev sets, excluding the issue of Lithuanian independence,” indicating that anything is negotiable except the March 11 independence proclamation.

Landsbergis reinforced that impression, leaving open a role for Moscow in Lithuanian affairs at least in the near term.

“No one here has the illusion that our declaration of independence gives us full independence,” he told the Supreme Council. “I think everything must be done step by step, by which I mean taking over the different functions of government.”

The Parliament’s five-member Presidium, which Landsbergis heads, sent a message to Gorbachev saying his weekend statements were being studied and inviting him to dispatch a representative “to present the position of the Soviet government in a more comprehensive manner.”

There was no immediate response from Moscow. Ozolas said he had called Defense Minister Dmitri T. Yazov but did not get a commitment to meet on topics of interest to his delegation, including the status of Lithuanians now in the Soviet army and the fate of deserters arrested last week while seeking refuge in two hospitals.

Another Lithuanian legislator, Egidius Bickaukas, has spent considerable time in Moscow since the independence declaration trying to get talks started, but without success.

The Lithuanian Parliament was considering its own response to Gorbachev’s weekend statements and was expected to pass a resolution today. Prime Minister Kazimiera Prunskiene told reporters in Vilnius that she has suggested to the Council of Ministers that a referendum be held, as Gorbachev has said is necessary before the secession can be legitimate.

But Prunskiene said the question asked voters should be: “Do you agree with the decisions made by the Supreme Council?” rather than a simple yes-or-no vote on independence.

“We’ve already solved this problem,” she said. “The declaration is legal and it’s already adopted, but by having a referendum we could affirm that the Parliament adopted the opinion of the majority of the people.”

Vilnius, a city of 579,000, was largely quiet, although several hundred demonstrators gathered outside government offices to protest the replacement of the republic’s top prosecutor, Arturas Paulauskas, by an official named from Moscow last week.

The Interfax news service of Radio Moscow said 95% of the senior officials of the Lithuanian prosecutor’s office expressed support for Paulauskas at a meeting.

NEXT STEP

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, having declared that he will not use force in Lithuania, has greatly limited his options. He has many instruments for pressure, as illustrated by Monday’s threatened press curbs, and the Soviet leadership is prepared to use them. Still, there could be costs. Lithuania is the sole producer, thanks to central planning, of many items required by the Soviet economy, and any economic boycott could hurt Moscow as much as Vilnius. Too much pressure could also harden the attitude of Lithuanians wavering on secession and further erode Gorbachev’s support on the radical left. It seems certain that the ultimate resolution of the secession crisis will shape the political environment in which Gorbachev must operate.