MOSCOW - Groups and individuals are using Russia's, democratic structures to create: "extremist, militarist, terrorist; and other armed formations", Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin has told leading officers of the Federal Security Service (FSB), a successor agency to the KGB, writes Seamus Martin.
Mr Chernomyrdin's statement came in the aftermath of the political upheaval following the dismissal of security chief, Gen Alexander Lebed, and in a tense political climate in the lead up to President Yeltsin's heart surgery next month.
The main target of the opposition attacks has been the current Kremlin Chief of Staff, Mr Anatoly Chubais, who, with Mr Yeltsin's younger daughter, Ms Tatyana Dyachenko, has been accused of setting up a "regency" during Mr Yeltsin's illness.
