Moscow: Boris Yeltsin, the first post-Soviet leader of Russia, issued a veiled warning yesterday that President Putin’s decision to hand new powers to the Kremlin in the wake of the Beslan hostage crisis could roll back democratic freedoms.
“We should not allow ourselves to step away from the letter — or the spirit — of a constitution that the country adopted in a national referendum in 1993,” he told the Moscow News daily. “The strangling of freedoms, the roll-back of democratic rights — this can only mean that the terrorists won.” Mr Putin announced plans to cancel voters’ right to elect regional governors after the Beslan siege, in which more than 330 people died. (AFP)