ABSTRACT
The 1998 Treaty was a relatively low-profile bilateral agreement in contrast to treaties signed in 1994, 1996, 1997, and 1999 that the Russian president masterfully used to promote his own ends. The Duma voted 209 to 51 against ratifying the 1993 Agreement between the Belarusian and Russian governments on the withdrawal of Russian troops from Belarus. In the very beginning of 1998, it was clear that Boris Yeltsin was not in full control of the country or even the government. A remarkable illustration for this claim is the following fact reported by Paul Goble. The procedure of impeachment instituted a year before, seemed unrealistic, at first, but with the fading of presidential power, communists who had initiated impeachment became confident that they could make it. The dismissal of the Kirienko Cabinet in the aftermath of the Russian financial crisis did not fully deflect popular anger for the simple reason that Yeltsin had appointed Kirienko only few months before the crisis.
