BACKING AWAY FROM BORIS

Despite guarded U.S. support for Yeltsin's right to put down the Chechnya rebellion,TIME State Department correspondent J.F.O. McAllisterreports that "subterranean turmoil" over how to handle the Russian leader is now festering in the Clinton Administration's ranks. At State, he says, several officials argued unsuccessfully for cancellation of a scheduled meeting in Geneva next week between Secretary of State Warren Christopher and Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev to discuss the future of NATO. McAllister says: "Here's a government (Russia) that's committing fairly substantial human rights abuses, and that's not something that Christopher can easily ignore or sidestep. Without advancing the discussion, why bother to have a meeting?"