MOSCOW, Jan 21, Reuter: Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev on Saturday described his country’s nine year military I Afghanistan as a “dictated that it had fuelled state spending and economic problems.
Gorbachev, in a speech to a conference of the Moscow Communist party, acknowledged the country was facing hard times but said the Soviet State had been somewhat unlucky in its recent attempts at economic reform.
He said State Finances had been hit by a drop in world market oil prices a major source of hard currency the 1986 nuclear accident at Chernobyl, last month’s earthquake in Armenia, involvement in Afghanistan and a cutback on alcohol sales.
It would have been good had we been lucky,” Gorbachev said in remarks carried by Soviet television.
But on the oil market the prices went down four or five times, Chernobyl, Armenia, Afghanistan our old sins, and so on and so on.
“We got a grip on vodka ourselves and although we don’t regret it we lost 40 billion roubles (65 billion dollars),” he said, referring to lost revenues from the kremlin’s crackdown on alcohol sales.
Under Gorbachev’s leadership the Soviet Union has pledged to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan by February 15. The Soviet forces were sent in December 1979 to bolster the Kabul government, now fighting Moslem rebels.
The Soviet Leader announced earlier this week that military spending would be reduced by 14.2 percent of its present secret figure. He said such cuts were necessary to try to halt growth in the Kremlin’s budget deficit.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 27, 1989
