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DATE=12/13/1999 TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT TITLE=RUSSIA PARLIAMENT (L ONLY) NUMBER=2-257091 BYLINE=PETER HEINLEIN DATELINE=MOSCOW CONTENT= VOICED AT: INTRO: Russia's Communist-led Duma, or lower house of parliament, has turned down a request to debate the long-delayed START-Two arms treaty at its final meeting before Sunday's parliamentary elections. /// OPT /// The treaty would reduce the number of strategic nuclear warheads held in the active inventories of the United States and Russia by more than 50 percent./// END OPT /// But, as V-O-A's Peter Heinlein reports from Moscow, the lawmakers overwhelmingly ratified another treaty forging closer links with neighboring Belarus. TEXT: The advertised debate on START-Two proved to be a non-starter. Parliamentary leaders last week reluctantly agreed to discuss the treaty, after hearing a plea from Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev. But the Duma's managing council Monday reversed that decision. Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov told reporters the question had not been prepared, and was not ready for debate. START-Two was signed in 1993, and ratified by the U-S Senate in 1996. But it has been stalled in the Duma, where hardliners maintain it would damage Russia's security. Monday's decision almost certainly kills any chance the current Duma would act on the treaty. Elections for a new parliament will be held next Sunday. Lawmakers did, however, take almost unanimous action on another accord, this one a union treaty with Belarus. The vote was 382 in favor, three against. The treaty signed last week by President Boris Yeltsin and Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko is largely symbolic. It stops far short of Mr. Lukashenko's stated goal of merging the two former Soviet republics into a single state. /// OPT /// In a speech to lawmakers, (Russian) Prime Minister Vladimir Putin urged prompt action on the treaty to ensure that neither side backs away from eventual reunification. /// OPT // PUTIN ACT - IN RUSSIAN - FADE UNDER /// /// OPT /// The Prime Minister says, "So we are obliged to take this step right now, before differences arise between us. It will be more difficult to unite later on." /// OPT /// Only one lawmaker, Sergei Yushenkov of the Radical Democrats spoke out against the treaty, and he was chastised by the leadership for pointing out that the Belarussian leader continues in office even though his original term has expired. /// OPT // YUSHENKOV ACT - IN RUSSIAN - FADE UNDER /// /// OPT /// He says, "This is not an agreement between Russia and Belarus, but between the Russian president and the illegitimate president of Belarus." /// OPT /// He was quickly silenced by the Communist House Speaker Gennady Seleznyov, who said "Stop insulting the head of a friendly state." /// END OPT /// Mr. Lukashenko's systematic crackdowns on political opponents and the independent media have made him a pariah in the international community. But at home, he maintains solid support with his Soviet-style populism. The concept of reunification remains popular in both Russia and Belarus, and Communist leaders suggest Ukraine will also eventually join. But Ukraine, under President Leonid Kuchma, has moved increasingly toward the West. Mr. Kuchma, who won re- election last month by a comfortable margin, said emphatically he does not want to link his country with any other former Soviet republics. (Signed) NEB/PFH/JWH/KL 13-Dec-1999 07:43 AM EDT (13-Dec-1999 1243 UTC) NNNN Source: Voice of America .