As President Boris Yeltsin on Tuesday again failed to issue a decree firing state television chief Oleg Poptsov, television officials suggested that earlier reports of Poptsov's impending dismissal had been put out as a warning for him to toe the line.


Yeltsin told human rights commissioner Sergei Kovalyov last week that he had signed a decree dismissing Poptsov for his station's coverage of the war in Chechnya. As soon as Russian State Television Company officials learned the news from Kovalyov, they called a staff meeting which appealed to Yeltsin not to issue the decree.


Poptsov's initial reaction was to criticize strongly Yeltsin's close aides for allegedly campaigning against him. But no decree came out, and Yeltsin's personal assistant, Viktor Ilyushin, denied its existence in a statement carried by Itar-Tass.


However, Poptsov and his aides are convinced that the decree exists and that influential figures in Yeltsin's government want Poptsov to know that his head is on the block.


"The execution has not been canceled but postponed," said Alexander Nekhoroshev, Russian Television's head of news broadcasting. "We found out from our sources that the decree is signed and sitting in the president's office, but it has no number yet, so it has not come into effect."


Poptsov held a press conference Tuesday, linking reports of his upcoming dismissal with his station's policy of carrying independent reports on Chechnya along with official propaganda.


However, Poptsov said his station was merely being objective.


"State television does not belong to the authorities but to society, to the public," he said.


He added that Russian Television has sought to be responsible in its coverage. Poptsov said the station has avoided showing scenes of carnage when it could in order not to cause anxiety among viewers.


"The authorities always eye the media jealously because we offer them no more than a seat among other viewers," Poptsov said. The audience, packed with far more Russian Television employees than visiting journalists, applauded.


Poptsov was careful not to criticize Yeltsin, saying that "the president has it harder than any of us because the burden of taking decisions is upon his shoulders." But he conceded that Yeltsin and other top Russian officials were constantly badgering him to alter the station's broadcasts in their favor.


"In the 20 minutes of our regular news broadcast, that beautiful ivory-colored high-frequency phone on my desk sometimes rings five or six times," Poptsov said. "And they ask me on the other end, 'Why is your guy saying this? Where did he get his information?'"


Nekhoroshev said Interior Minister Viktor Yerin had recently told Poptsov that he would campaign for his dismissal. Nekhoroshev quoted Deputy Prime Minister Nikolai Yegorov, one of the top proponents of the Chechen campaign, as saying that "after the campaign is over, the cannons will turn on Russian Television."


Poptsov told the press conference that under this constant pressure, the threat of a not-quite-signed decree was worse than a straight dismissal.


"This sword of Damocles is probably worse than if I had been laid off," he said. "But the main thing for us now is to keep doing our job."


Nekhoroshev said the station, which Poptsov has headed since its foundation in 1990, had become accustomed to political pressure. It had been under constant fire from Soviet officials before the abortive coup of August 1991 and then from anti-Yeltsin legislators in the old Supreme Soviet.


"It's ironic that the president who came to power on the wave of democratic hope is now himself initiating a crackdown on the media," Nekhoroshev said.