The Michigan Daily - Thursday, December 10, 1992 - Page 3
Congress
rejects
Yeltsin
nomn1ee
MOSCOW (AP) - President
Boris Yeltsin suffered a bruising
defeat yesterday when Congress re-
jected his reform-minded nominee
for prime minister, clearing the way
for new hard-line attacks that could
slow reforms.
The vote does not immediately
force Yegor Gaidar out of office.
Gaidar said he would remain as
"acting" prime minister, the position
he has held for six months.
The Congress of People's
Deputies, dominated by ex-Commu-
nists elected before the Soviet col-
lapse, rejected Gaidar's nomination
on a secret-ballot vote of 486-467.
The result was 54 votes short of
the majority needed for approval by
the 1,041-member Congress.
Twenty-two ballots were invalid and
the remaining 26 lawmakers did not
vote.
Lawmakers reacted almost non-
* halantly to the pivotal vote after
nine days of sometimes violent de-
bate in the Grand Kremlin Palace.
Although Yeltsin can reappoint
Gaidar as acting prime minister, the
rejection amounted to a resounding
vote of no confidence in the presi-
dent's reforms, which hard-liners
say are impoverishing the nation.
As the architect of Russia's re-
forms, Gaidar has become the symn-
bol of Yeltsin's determination to
dismantle seven decades of Comn-
munist central planning and state
ownership.
The economist also has become a
target for Yeltsin's opposition,
which has grown in strength in re-
cent months along with the free-
market scourges of inflation and un-
employment.
"We're going to do
everything we can to
make sure (Yegor)
Gaidar is not the prime
minister.'
- Mikhail Aksyuchits
Russian people's deputy
"We will continue to work
calmly until the president decides
differently," Gaidar told reporters
outside the hall. "The Russian peo-
ple (do not) treat the results of the
Congress with deep approval."
The Cabinet was clearly con-
cerned about the results. Ministers
planned to meet after the session
yesterday, and the main parliamen-
tary opposition bloc, Civic Union,
also was huddling after the Congress
adjourned.
Yeltsin's aides insist the presi-
dent is empowered to keep Gaidar in
the job for three months under cur-
rent Russian law, extending the title
he has held since June without par-
liamentary approval.
"We're going to do everything
we can to make sure Gaidar is not
the prime minister. He has become
completely bankrupt in the posi-
tion," declared Mikhail Aksyuchits,
a leader of the Russian Christian
Democratic Party.
Hindu-Muslim
religious rioting
continues in India
NEW DELHI, India (AP) -
Rioters wielding hatchets and
homemade bombs rampaged
throughout India yesterday in the
third day of religious violence.
Reports said nearly 700 people died
in Hindu-Muslim fighting - includ-
ing 200 yesterday alone.
Zealots, acting in the name of re-
ligion, left a trail of brutality and
desecration as they battled over the
demolition of an ancient mosque by
Hindu extremists on Sunday.
Since then, Bombay's massive
slum district, Dharabi - a patch-
work of Hindu and Muslim colonies
- has become a war zone. Nightly
raiding parties attack neighboring
colonies with knives, hatchets,
Molotov cocktails and light bulbs
filled with acid.
Army units, with shoot-on-sight
authority, were sent to assist police
in enforcing a curfew in the city of
12 million -India's largest and the
hardest hit by the religious violence.
The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya
Janata Party called a general strike to
protest the arrest of its leaders, who
are charged with instigating the de-
molition of the mosque in the north-
ern holy town of Ayodhya.
Prime Minister Narasimha Rao
met leaders of the National Front -
a leftist opposition coalition - to
appeal for an alliance against the
Hindu nationalist party in an attempt
to quell the violence. He accused the
Bharatiya Janata of "extreme per-
fidy" by encouraging the zealots
who tore apart the mosque.
Rao's Congress Party falls short
of a majority in parliament, and he
appeared to be suggesting a broad-
ened coalition to isolate the
Bharatiya Janata.
The National Front previously
had blamed Rao for letting hundreds
of thousands of Hindu fanatics into
Ayodhya and demanded that he quit.
Devout Hindus believe the 430-
year-old mosque stood on the ruins
of a prehistoric Hindu shrine mark-
ing the birthplace of Rama, an im-
portant god in Hindu mythology.
The mosque's destruction
prompted widespread savagery and
destruction in India and in neighbor-
ing Pakistan and Bangladesh.
The government put the official
toll throughout India at 560 dead and
2,475 wounded. News agencies --
which compiled their tolls from local
police stations and put the number of
dead at nearly 700 - were consid-
ered to be more accurate.
Look out below!
A bird's eye view of students putting the final touches on term papers yesterday in the Angell Hall Courtyard
Computing Site.
National panel says impotence can be
cured through psychological therapy
Healh experts clear up misconcepdons about ink bet wen impotence and aging
WASHINGTON (AP) -
Impotence is neither inevitable nor
untreatable and, with proper therapy,
men can be sexually active for a life-
time, a National Institutes of Health
panel of experts concluded
yesterday.
The 14-member committee, in a
statement summarizing the recom-
mended medical care for patients
with impotence, said that age alone
is not the cause of the male dysfunc-
tion and that the condition can be
successfully treated by several
different therapies.
"One of the myths is that the el-
derly become impotent because they
are old. That is not true," said Dr.
John Beck, a professor of geriatrics
at the UCLA School of Medicine
and a member of the panel.
Impotence is caused by physical
or psychological conditions that can
be treated successfully, the commit-
tee said. However, it all depends
upon a willingness of patients to ac-
cept frank, comprehensive discus-
sion of their sexual history, to un-
dergo thorough medical examina-
tions and to seek out knowledgeable
physicians.
What the committee did not find
was the proven value of any of the
traditional herbal or over-the-counter -
treatments for impotence. The panel
said they had no scientific evidence
that such things as rhinoceros horns
or plant extracts can work as
aphrodisiacs.
"For thousands of years there
have been various things proposed
as aphrodisiacs," said Dr. William
Bremner, a professor of medicine at
the University of Washington.
"Nothing that can be taken by mouth
has ever been proven to be effective
for impotence."
Another committee member, Dr.
Thomas Rohner Jr., a professor at
the Pennsylvania State University
College of Medicine, noted: "There
is no pill that you can take."
Impotence, or erection dysfunc-
tion as the committee preferred to
'One of the myths is
that the elderly
become impotent
because they are old.
That is not true.'
-Dr. John Beck
panel member
call it, affects 10 to 20 million
American men, with perhaps 10 mil-
lion others having partial
dysfunction, the panel said.
Though for decades the problem
was accepted as the natural result of
age and few men sought medical so-
lutions, that perception is changing,
said Dr. Michael Droller, committee
member and chair of the urology
department at the Mount Sinai
Medical Center in New York.
"Increasingly, more and more
men are seeking treatments that will
allow them to return to a satisfactory
level and range of sexual activities,"
he said.
The panel said treatment for
impotence, should start with a care-
ful sexual and medical history, and
psychological therapy for both the
patient and his principal partner.
Patients may have to seek out ex-
perts in the field, the panel said, be-
cause primary physicians often are
untrained in impotence treatment.
"Erectile dysfunction is poorly
understood by the general pop-
ulation and by most health-care
professionals," the committee report
said.
Chronic physical conditions, or
drugs to treat these conditions, often
are the cause of impotence, and the
committee said physicians should
"inquire into the sexual functioning
of their patients and be prepared to
offer counsel."
About 25 percent of all impo-
tence, the committee said, is caused
by drugs given to treat other
conditions.
The problem can be in the mind,
the report said.
"Psychological therapy alone is
appropriate for patients in whom no
organic cause of erectile dysfunction
is detected," the study reported.
"Working with the sexual partner
is useful in improving the outcome
of therapy."
Medical therapy should start with
the simplest procedure, and more in-
vasive treatments, such as surgery,
should be used only when other
techniques fail or appear
inappropriate.
Along the mighty Huron...
Ann Arbor resident Salli Christenson stands by a dam along the Huron
River yesterday while fishing.
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Student groups
U AIDS Coalition to Unleash
Power, meeting, East Engineer-
ing Building, Baker-Mandela
Center, 7:30 p.m.
Institute of Electrical and Elec-
tronics Engineers, technical
luncheon, Electrical Engineer-
ing and Computer Science
Building, Room 1311, 12:30-
1:30 p.m.
U Intervarsity Christian Fellow-
ship, meeting, Natural Re-
sources Building, Room 1040,
7 p.m.
U Korean Student Association,
meeting, Michigan Union,
Welker Room, 7 p.m.
U Newman Catholic Student As-
sociation, Parish Pastoral Coun-
cil, Saint Mary Student Chapel,
331 Thompson St., 7 p.m.
U Pro-Choice Action, meeting,
MLB, Room B 137, 7:30 p.m.
U U-M Sailing Club, meeting,
West Enaineerine Builcdine.
Events
U "A Tribute to Thelonius
Monk," jazz performance, U-
M School of Music Program in
Jazz and Contemporary Impro-
vised Music, Rackham Build-
ing, Auditorium, 8 p.m.
U Live Jazz, sponsored by School
of Music Jazz Studies Program,
8-10 p.m., call 764-7544 for
more information.
U Pediatric AIDS Discussion,
sponsored by Future Physicians
for Social Responsibility, Michi-
gan Union, Wolverine Room,
7-8:30 p.m.
U Russian Tea and Conversation
Practice, Slavic Department,
MLB, 3rd floor Conference
Room, 4-5 p.m.
U "Surface Chemistry of Poly-
meric Materials: Synthesis
Characterizations and Appli-
cations," analytical seminar,
sponsored by Department of
ChemistrvChemistry Building
Department of Near Eastern
Studies, Rackham Building, As-
sembly Hall, 4th floor, 7:30 p.m.
Q "The Black Panthers," docu-
mentary film, sponsored by
Maoist Internationalist Move-
ment, East Quad, Room 124, 7
p.m.
Q "The Cultivated Image: Gar-
den Photographs by Michael
Kenna," lecture, Rackham
Building, Institute for the Hu-
manities, Room 1524,4 p.m.
Q University Choir, concert, Hill
Auditorium, 8 p.m.
Student services
Q Northwalk Safety Walking Ser-
vice, Burslcv Hall, lobby, 763-
WALK, 8 p.m.-1:30 a.m.
U Psychology Undergraduate
Peer Advising, Department of
Psychology, West Quad, room
K210, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
Q Safewa'k Safety Walking Ser-
vice.UGC- lobby.936-1000.8
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