Russian press ignores Yeltsin’s illness

MOSCOW, DEC 12: Although President Boris Yeltsin's hospitalisation was reported around the world, in the Russian press which is used to his...

MOSCOW, DEC 12: Although President Boris Yeltsin’s hospitalisation was reported around the world, in the Russian press which is used to his chronically precarious health, it was almost a non-story.

The big story in the flag-ship newspaper Izvestia today was the hijacking of a Russian internal passenger flight on Wednesday. Up in the right-hand corner a two-sentence note said that Boris Yeltsin was hospitalised.

The influential daily newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta also gave prominence on its front page to the hijacking of the airliner. In the left column a short squeeze said, the President apparently had flu.

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The Kommersant Daily, the leading business newspaper, said on its front page: The President Is On Sick Leave. Inside, it covered the impact of Yeltsin’s hospitalisation on the Russian stock market with equity and bond prices both taking a dive.

Yeltsin is experiencing some discomfort with his slightly elevated temperature, Russian media reported today quoting his doctors as saying. On Wednesday, he was taken to the Barvikha sanatorium from his Gorky-9 residence.

Because his upper respiratory system is inflamed, doctors treating him advised him to hold off from recording his weekly radio address. Although he was able to meet his chief of staff on Thursday, he is expected to remain in the sanatorium for about two weeks.

Also he cancelled his first round-table meeting with the Opposition scheduled for Thursday, which was intended to seek resolution of a logjam over whether to allow private sales of land. That along with everything else on the President’s public agenda has been postponed indefinitely.