Russian security aide may be ousted

MOSCOW, Dec. 2 (JTA) — Russian President Boris Yeltsin may soon oust a senior security official who recently admitted to possessing dual Russian-Israeli citizenship. According to a Kremlin source, Yeltsin believes that the reputation of Boris Berezovsky, a businessman-turned-politician, was seriously damaged by the recent scandal that erupted when it was reported that he had applied for and received Israeli citizenship. Berezovsky, who in the early 1990s made a fortune in the automobile business, was appointed deputy secretary of Russia’s National Security Council in October. Within weeks, reports surfaced in the Moscow press that he had been a citizen of the Jewish state since 1993. Berezovsky denied at the time that he had dual citizenship and said he would sue the newspapers for libel. But he later admitted to reporters that he had indeed at one time possessed an Israeli passport, adding that he had requested that the passport be annulled after he was appointed to the security council. According to a Russian law that Yeltsin signed this summer, no Russian can be employed in government service if he or she possesses a second citizenship.