MOLDOVA: RADICAL OPPOSITION RALLIES IN CITY HEART

CHISINAU, May 16 (RIA Novosti's Vladimir Novosadyuk) - "Open-air pageant," the city people are saying of this morning's Christian Democratic Popular Party congress. Radical opposition chose Chisinau's central square for venue. The gathering-approximately a thousand-had brought plastic chairs with them for a comfortable session. Interspersing congress speeches were anti-Russian, anti-Communist and anti-government mottoes the audience was chanting, as is the Moldovan Christian Democratic wont.

The speakers came down on Centrist parties, who had turned down a recent Christian Democratic call for an anti-Communist bloc.

The public shrugged off the gathering to hurry past.

The party had to rally in the open after municipal authorities refused to provide decent premises for a huge gathering, said Juri Rosca, party leader-to send newsmen on the audience chuckling, with the modest number of congress delegates.

The congress took stock of political, social and economic developments in Moldova, and Christian Democratic strategies and tactics for the twelve months before a parliamentary election. Resolutions were passed on a current economic crisis and on rampant corruption.

The event had a spicy musical background-a retro brass band concert in the Pushkin Park nearby, whose Soviet tunes of the 1950s into 80s attracted a far bigger audience of all ages.