Russian Speaker Causes Kosovo Missile Scare

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia`s Communist parliamentary speaker caused a stir on Friday by saying President Boris Yeltsin had targeted the country`s nuclear missiles at NATO states involved in air strikes on Yugoslavia. The Strategic Rocket Forces swiftly said it was not aware of any change in its standing orders - under which the missiles are aimed at no one but can be quickly targeted - and Kremlin officials could not be reached for comment. But Gennady Seleznyov, who is speaker of the State Duma lower house and returned from a mission to Belgrade on Thursday, stuck to his guns. Asked whether Yeltsin really told him missiles had been retargeted, he told reporters at the Duma: "Yes, he said against those countries which are carrying out military action against Yugoslavia. I`m surprised television reports on my meeting with the president have not been broadcast yet." Earlier, Yeltsin had already hardened his stance in the crisis. Seleznyov said Yeltsin had backed a request for Yugoslavia to join a pan-Slav pact with Russia and Belarus. Yeltsin also said Russia would never allow NATO to turn Serbia`s Kosovo province into a "protectorate". Against the backdrop of a looming impeachment vote in the Communist- and nationalist-dominated lower house of parliament, Yeltsin said he believed NATO would not dare to launch a ground offensive in Kosovo but would pay if it did. Belarus said they backed the request from Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic for his fellow Slav country to join their loose, odd-couple union as a way to solve the crisis. On Thursday, Yeltsin had seemed to pre-empt Milosevic by saying it was premature to consider a union with Yugoslavia. It was Seleznyov who conveyed the request from Belgrade to Yeltsin. Yugoslavia has no common border with either country and was never a part of the Soviet Union. While apparently backing Belgrade`s request, Yeltsin reiterated Russia would not provide military aid to Yugoslavia. But Seleznyov, who is fiercely anti-NATO, said a three-way union would mean even more than military assistance. "I think that our army would be there too, that our navy would be in the appropriate seas," he told reporters. The giant Russian Federation and Belarus have signed a series of agreements over the past three years to bring their countries closer, including in defence matters, but the two states remain distinct. Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko rejects the kind of post-Soviet market reforms Russia has introduced. Yugoslavia already has observer status in the parliamentary assembly of the Russia-Belarus union but Milosevic has not openly called for membership in the overall union. It was not immediately clear why Yeltsin had changed his mind overnight - if indeed he had. But one Kremlin source, not surprisingly, saw a domestic political angle to the day`s developments. Yeltsin faces a possible impeachment vote in the Duma next Thursday. The Duma is dominated by Communists and nationalists who are almost as vocal in their criticism of NATO as they are of Yeltsin.