Soviets Say It’s Business as Usual for Investment : Conference: Despite the political turmoil, foreigners tell Americans that the communist country remains committed to reform, expanded trade.

Visiting Soviet businessmen, engineers and a legal adviser assured their American counterparts Tuesday that it is still safe to start business ventures in the Soviet Union despite the sudden political upheaval.

“Foreign trade relations will be kept . . . so you should have no doubt about that,” said Kamil Bekyashev, an adviser on international business law, through an interpreter to about 25 Orange County business people who came to the Fullerton Marriott hotel to hear about doing business in the Soviet Union.

The Soviet speakers were among a 25-member delegation on a three-week exchange program at Cal State Fullerton, who are from Intermet Engineering, the private arm of the Moscow Institute for Steel & Alloys.

Bekyashev told the press he has known interim President Gennady I. Yanayev for 26 years and is sure he supports all of Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s reforms except for one--how fast the Soviet Union should enter a market economy.

Yanayev believes that if the change comes too soon, less competitive workers, such as the elderly and mothers with young children, will suffer because “the market will not let them in,” Bekyashev said. “Therefore, we should enter the market economy step by step.”

But the country must take that step forward, and Soviet government officials know this, he added. “Without the international market, we will not survive.”

An engineering professor with the delegation also urged the audience to continue considering investing in the Soviet Union.

“My concept was, in general, during this speech (to say): ‘Don’t worry, and be ready to make your investment tomorrow,’ ” said German Surguchev of the steel and alloys institute. “Today, I can’t say don’t worry, but I surely can say . . . ‘Be ready to make your investment the day after tomorrow.’ ”

Before the seminar started, several of the Soviets who speak English found themselves surrounded by the media. The Soviets answered questions in cautious tones and said they only wanted to comment on economic issues and not on the troubled political situation back home.

“We’re looking forward to a good relationship with American businessmen,” said Vyacheslav Chernyshev, Intermet’s director general.

Asked if American businessmen should trust investing in the Soviet Union after Gorbachev’s recent removal, he answered, “We in the future will have a better situation.”

Chernyshev did get through on the phone to his wife Monday night and to his assistant early Tuesday morning, he said, and they assured him things are all right.