Jeremy Holland, age 16, of St.Augustine, Fla., for his question:

IN RUSSIA, WHAT IS THE POLITBURO?

The Politburo is the political bureau of the Central Committee that controls the Communist Party in Russia. The Central Committee also has an organizational bureau, the Orgburo. These two bureaus were set up in 1919. In 1952 they were merged to form the Presidium of the Central Committee.

In 1966, the Presidium was renamed the Politburo.

In the early days of the Politburo, members were Bolshevik leaders. Lenin dominated the group until his death.

At one time Stalin had control of the Politburo and gradually removed his political and party adversaries from it. He replaced them with hand picked associates. After Stalin's death, Nikita Khrushchev handled the Presidium the same way.

Now, members of the Politburo are men who have worked their way up in the party hierarchy, rather than starting as professional revolutionaries as earlier members did.

The first Politburo had five members. The Politburo now has 15 full members and seven alternate or nonvoting members.