
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, May 15, 1990                   TAG: 9005150016
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MOSCOW                                LENGTH: Medium

GORBACHEV REJECTS PLEAS FROM BALTICS

President Mikhail Gorbachev on Monday declared independence moves by Latvia and Estonia legally invalid but gave no hint whether he would retaliate with sanctions as he has with Lithuania.

In two presidential decrees, read on the nightly TV news program "Vremya," Gorbachev clearly rejected a weekend appeal by the three Baltic presidents to recognize their statehood.

The decrees said Latvia's May 4 declaration of independence and Estonia's March 30 declaration that it was an occupied country violated Soviet law and the constitution.

In Latvia, officials said they awaited an anti-independence demonstration outside the Parliament building and a republic-wide political strike today. Helicopters dropped leaflets on the Latvian capital of Riga on Monday calling for the strike and protest.

The Soviet Union forcibly annexed Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia in 1940. Lithuania declared its independence March 11 and began passing laws toward that end, enraging Moscow and bringing on an embargo of oil, natural gas and other raw materials.

The presidential decrees, in dry, legal language, listed the points of the law and constitution violated by the Estonian and Latvian measures.

Gorbachev rebuked the two republics, saying Estonia acted "without having consulted with the people of the republic, ignoring its existing economic, political, cultural and legal ties" with Moscow. He said Latvia had "gone against the rights and interests of other subjects of the Soviet federation."

Gorbachev called Latvia's decree "invalid from the moment of its passage," and the same went for Estonia's measure.

On Saturday, the three Baltic presidents revived a 1934 Council of Baltic States, pledging cooperation and asking Gorbachev and President Bush to discuss their independence at the U.S.-Soviet summit opening May 30.

by CNB