Mr. Sarkozy said terrorist organizations had begun to use bases in the troubled former Soviet republics Chechnya and Georgia.

"Our press long ago lost any influence over society," said Obdurashid Saidov, a journalist from Dagestan, a troubled southern republic.

The diplomat did not mention the Kremlin's longstanding anxiety about what the collapse of central government here and the rise of Muslim fundamentalism might mean for the troubled Muslim republics in the south of the Soviet Union, but the implication seemed clear.

"It was all so quick," said an officer headed for the troubled Soviet republic of Georgia.

More telling about his plans to come was his reference to an obscure electoral dispute in Karachayevo-Cherkessia, one of the troubled republics of the North Caucasus.

At a meeting in Brussels this month, community members agreed to try to grant recognition to the troubled multi-ethnic republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina and perhaps to Macedonia at their next session, on April 6.

An explosion ripped out the roof of a thermal power plant in Azerbaijan, disrupting electricity in the troubled republic, Tass reported today.

Page A1 Azerbaijanis and Armenians fled their homes in fear of further violence, officials in the two troubled Soviet republics said.

Moscow gained an opportunity to present the events as an "inter-ethnic conflict" - it could then position itself as "peacemaker" restoring order in a troubled republic.

NATO is planning to send a force of up to 3,000 troops to Macedonia to disarm ethnic Albanian rebels if a political settlement is reached to end the insurgency in the troubled republic.