Students Riot in Capital of Soviet Region After Ouster of Party Chief, Tass Says

MOSCOW — Students rioted in the streets of Alma Ata, the capital of Soviet Kazakhstan, to protest the ouster of a veteran Kazakh leader of the Kazakhstan Communist Party and his replacement by an ethnic Russian, the Tass news agency reported Thursday.

Tass, in an unusually candid report, said “hooligans, parasites and other anti-social persons” set fire to a food store and private cars, insulted citizens and “resorted to unlawful actions against representatives of law and order.” The three-paragraph story gave no estimate of damages and no indication of whether there were injuries during the demonstration in the capital of the Central Asian republic.

A group of students were “incited by nationalistic elements,” Tass said, and staged street demonstrations Wednesday night and Thursday against the removal of Dinmukhamed (Dimash) A. Kunayev and his replacement by Gennady V. Kolbin as first secretary of the Kazakhstan party.

Forced From Office

The decision to oust Kunayev, who had led the regional party for 22 years, was made Tuesday by the party’s central committee at a meeting in Alma Ata, according to a previous Tass report.

Kunayev, 74, is also a member of the 12-man national Politburo, but it is almost certain he will lose that post after being removed from the Kazakh party position. According to the official version of events, he was retired at his own request, but the lack of praise for his past work indicated that he had been forced out of office.

His dismissal may have been connected to Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s campaign against party corruption and industrial inefficiency. The national press has repeatedly criticized Kazakhstan for corruption and its inability to solve economic problems.

Kolbin, 59, was first secretary of the party in the Ulyanovsk region, where he earned a reputation for strongly supporting Gorbachev’s programs.

Kazakhstan comprises one-eighth of the huge Soviet land mass but has only 16 million people. Kazakhs, a Turko-Mongol people descended from nomads, now account for less than 50% of the republic’s population. Slavic people--including Russians, Ukrainians and Byelorussians--make up the majority.

Order Restored

It had been traditional for a Kazakh to occupy the top party post and for a Russian to serve as the deputy, or second secretary. Former Soviet leader Leonid I. Brezhnev, for example, was second secretary of the Kazakh party during the middle 1950s.

Tass, in its extraordinary report of violent protests against a Communist Party decision, said that order has been restored and that the city was back to normal by Thursday night.

Meetings of workers were held in factories and other places, the Tass account said, and party activists also assembled to discuss the protests.

“They supported the decisions of the plenary meeting of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan, condemned the totally unwarranted actions of the group of students and declared for the adoption of resolute measures against the hooligans and for the restoration of complete order in the city,” the Tass account said.

“The actions taken in this direction are supported by the working people,” Tass said. “They are actively taking part in the measures carried out by government and party bodies,” it added.

Disorder Widespread

“All enterprises, institutions, educational establishments, stores, utilities and city transport are working normally,” Tass said.

The unusual acknowledgment of the Alma Ata disturbances may mean that disorder in the city of 1 million people was widespread and that the Kremlin realized that word would eventually reach the West.

Nationalist demonstrations occurred in Georgia in the late 1970s and were eventually reported by Western news agencies, but the state press did not mention them. There also have been reports of demonstrations in the Baltic republics of Lithuania and Estonia, also not officially acknowledged.

The new show of candor may also reflect Gorbachev’s emphasis on glasnost --openness--in the administration of the country and a greater willingness to confront problems.