Book reveals key Soviet debates

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Mikhail Gorbachev's battle to push through far-reaching reforms in the Soviet Union is revealed in notes from key Communist Party meetings.

The book "Inside the Communist Party Central Committee Politburo" includes heated discussions about the Soviet troop withdrawal from Afghanistan.

It covers the period from 1985, when Mr Gorbachev launched the perestroika reforms, to the USSR's fall in 1991.

The notes were made by Gorbachev aides on their own initiative.

"Nobody instructed us to do this, but nobody stopped us either, although all Politburo members knew perfectly well that since Stalin's time it was forbidden to record anything," one of the aides, Anatoly Chernyayev, told the BBC Russian service.

"We made notes of everything, apart from trivia, and tried to give a lively picture of events. They argued, swore at each other, roughed each other up," he said.

'A real gift'

The most interesting features, he said, were the formulation of Gorbachev's perestroika programme and the former Soviet leader's abandonment of the Stalin personality cult.

Former Politburo aides Vadim Medvedev and Georgy Shakhnazarov also made notes that now appear in the book.

Russian historian Roy Medvedev described the book as "a real gift".

"The hardest task for historians is to find out how decisions are taken," he said at the presentation of the book by Mr Gorbachev on Tuesday.

Mr Gorbachev meanwhile said his former rival Boris Yeltsin "should have been sent to the diplomatic corps" and separatists in the former USSR "should have been hit hard", Russian media reported.