Yeltsin Vows To Put Up Fight

With much of Moscow down with the flu, President Boris Yeltsin returned to the Kremlin on Friday after two months of treatment for heart disease and stepped out in the snow to talk politics with passers-by.

Meeting with ordinary citizens for the first time since falling ill, Yeltsin looked vigorous and vowed again to defend his post-Soviet reforms from the Communist-led Parliament elected Dec. 17. “We won’t give anyone an opportunity to move backward,” he said.

But he said the election had taught politicians a lesson that “when reforming the national economy, they should not forget about people” - a likely sign of policy adjustments ahead.

Final official results Friday gave the resurgent Communist Party 157 of the 450 seats in the Duma, or lower house. The Communist total reached 187 with the seats won by three socialist splinter parties.