Latest Developments

The major stories coming out of the Soviet Union:

* BALTIC INDEPENDENCE: The Soviet Union gave up three prizes it had held for half a century: the Baltic republics of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. The move came at the inaugural meeting of the day-old State Council and was the first concrete episode in the breakup of the Soviet Union. “We are witnessing a historic point in time,” said Lithuanian President Vytautus Landsbergis in Vilnius, his capital. Soviet Foreign Minister Boris N. Pankin said negotiations would be held quickly with the three states on a range of issues from economic relations to the fate of the estimated 250,000 Soviet soldiers and sailors still stationed on their territories.

* SOVIET ECONOMY: Although the republics that have elected to stay in the Soviet Union have agreed to let a new “Inter-Republic Economic Committee” coordinate the vast task of economic reform within the crumbling union, Western analysts say many crucial questions remain unresolved. But some fear that the republics, heady in their initial burst of freedom and unaccustomed to the mechanics of the free market, may be going too far to separate themselves from each other.

* ACTION ON REACTORS: The Soviet Union has decided to let outsiders examine suspect nuclear reactors, cutting the risk of a second Chernobyl disaster, safety experts say. They add that the Soviet Union has 15 to 20 reactors of the type that blew up at Chernobyl in 1986, scattering radioactive fallout across Europe.

* MEANWHILE, IN JAIL . . . : The 14 men under arrest for plotting to overthrow Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev are sharing cells peacably with other suspected criminals and cooperating with interrogators, but it will be months before their cases come to court, Russia’s chief prosecutor said.