Top Yeltsin Aide Decries Plans to Expand NATO

Any hopes that the reelection of Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin would temper long-standing Russian opposition to NATO expansion were dashed Monday when a top Yeltsin aide issued a stinging rebuke of the military alliance’s enlargement plans.

In the first official statement on the subject since Yeltsin’s victory last week, presidential advisor Dmitri B. Ryurikov told a gathering here of Central and Eastern European leaders that the election makes enlargement of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization “an even more contentious issue than ever.”

Yeltsin’s decisive victory over opponents of reform, Ryurikov said, should demonstrate to the West that democracy is firmly entrenched in Russia and that the time has come for NATO to abandon its “stubborn reluctance” to heed Moscow’s objections.

The future of Russian-NATO relations, he said, hinges on such a recognition by the United States and other NATO powers.

“Russia would be ready to have contractual relations with a changing but not enlarging NATO,” Ryurikov said. “One thing is important: Russia, a major European state, must be a full-fledged participant in decision-making on European security. Russia will not accept it when, on issues important to it, it is only being consulted and is left aside when decisions are made.”

In a direct assault on the NATO ambitions of the three Baltic countries, Ryurikov likened the treatment of Russian minorities there to apartheid and expressed shock at a military alliance that would consider such countries for membership.

“Russia cannot remain indifferent to assurances that the Baltic countries will join NATO,” he said.

The comments were a blast of Arctic air at a conference called to discuss economic, political and military cooperation in the countries of the former Eastern Bloc. Hosted by the Swiss-based World Economic Forum, the gathering has attracted more than a dozen heads of state and prime ministers from throughout the region, as well as several hundred other government officials, scholars and business people.

“During the election campaign, there were some indications that Russia might be backing off a little on its opposition [to NATO enlargement], but this makes it clear they are taking a hard-line stance,” said Marshall Goldman, associate director of the Russian Research Center at Harvard University. “Russia is looking inward and feeling abused. They are saying, ‘You won the Cold War, why must you now kick us in the face?’ ”