LONDON -- Boris Fyodorov, the former Russian deputy prime minister, has attacked last week's International Monetary Fund agreement to provide a $1.5 billion loan to Russia and said it would change the government's policies for the worse.


"The sooner this money is handed over, the sooner we shall see a change in policy -- in the wrong direction," Fyodorov wrote in an article in Monday's Financial Times.


"The $1.5 billion is immaterial to Russia, given the scale of its problems, and would be eaten up in a matter of minutes," Fyodorov said. "Its importance is that it would be taken as a seal of approval on 'corrections' to the policy."


Fyodorov, who resigned in January as deputy prime minister for finance, said that before any money was released the West should wait for parliament to approve the budget and for the government's track record on low inflation to be established.


He added: "I recall how former president Mikhail Gorbachev, after each new Western loan, would lose interest in any kind of economic reform."


Fyodorov, now a deputy in the State Duma, the lower house of parliament, said he still supported President Boris Yeltsin and was committed "up to the hilt" to Russia's economic reforms.


"But I am sure that a weakening of the Western position on stabilization will be detrimental to my country," he said.