Yeltsin informs Gorbachev of results of Minsk meeting, Gorbachev proposes referendum
This news story first came out 30 years ago to the day, and we are publishing it today as part of Interfax's project, "Timeline of the Last Days of USSR. This Day 30 Years Ago." The project's goal is to reconstruct as fully as possible the timeline of the last few months of 1991 and to give everyone interested in understanding the historical processes of that period the opportunity to study and analyze the events that led to and accompanied the collapse of the Soviet Union and the emergence of the new Russian state. The complete timeline can be found in Russian.
MOSCOW. Dec 10 (Interfax) – A meeting of Russian President Boris Yeltsin, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and USSR President Mikhail Gorbachev took place on Monday, December 9.
Yeltsin informed Gorbachev of the results of the Minsk meeting.
On Monday evening the USSR president published a statement in which Gorbachev said that "the future of the multinational state cannot be defined by the leaders of the three republics." He suggested calling a congress of USSR people deputies in order to consider the current situation.
Gorbachev did not rule out that a national referendum could be held in order to define the new form of state for the former USSR.
Nuclear button
"A civilized transfer of power as far as the control of the 'nuclear button' is concerned should be ensured" in the next few days, Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev said.
Nazarbayev said that "nuclear weapons deployed in Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan must be controlled from a single center."
Economic cooperation in CIS
Belarus, Russia and Ukraine agreed to synchronize economic policies and announced their intention to "abstain from any actions that inflict economic damage on each other." The republics will conduct settlements and build economic relations with the ruble as the currency, but do not rule out introducing national currencies in the future. They intend to sign an interbank agreement to limit money emission.
Belarus, Russia and Ukraine agreed to coordinate foreign economic activity and customs policies and ensure freedom of transit.
CIS and economic community
"The establishment of the CIS does not mean Russia’s withdrawal from the economic community [an economic agreement on the common market signed by the majority of former USSR republics]," state advisor of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic Sergei Shakhrai said in an interview with Interfax.
Нe said the Minsk agreement, as stipulated in one of its clauses, does not affect the signatories’ commitments to third countries.
At the same time, the Russian president’s press secretary said on Monday that the inter-republican economic committee, the main coordinating body of the economic community, does not exist anymore.