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On the eve of parliament's vote on whether to keep the government, former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev issued an open letter blasting the current regime and warning of "coups ... social misery and rot."
Gorbachev's letter did not refer specifically to the planned vote, but he joined the chorus of critics, accusing President Boris Yeltsin's government of "rapacious privatization, squandering of public wealth and brazen criminal outrages."
"The country is being objectively pushed into the abyss of military-political coups, into a protracted period of social misery and rot," wrote Gorbachev, a longtime rival of Yeltsin, in a letter carried by Itar-Tass and Interfax.
Gorbachev said the falling ruble and rising prices "have graphically revealed the ruling regime's inability to rectify a vicious course.''
The former president also called for immediate presidential and parliamentary elections.
Gorbachev Blasts Regime
27 October 1994
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