``A short ailment is one thing, but if the man cannot work and fulfill his duties then it is necessary to find the will and courage to say so,'' Interfax news agency quoted Luzhkov as saying. Luzhkov has said he may run for presidency in 2000.

``Today everything depends on the president's decision,'' added Luzhkov, who in the past has generally been loyal to the Kremlin.

Even the normally pro-president daily Izvestia conceded that Yeltsin cannot carry out his responsibilities or at least some of them, owing to his deteriorating health.

However, the daily made a strong plea to all political parties to give up the campaign for his resignation and the move in Duma for his impeachment, ``as respect for political decency and law must be displayed,'' it said.

Yeltsin is convalescing from tracheo-bronchitisat his country residence outside Moscow. The illness forced him to cut short his trip to Central Asian countries earlier this week.

Doctors advised that Yelstin, who has a long history of health problems, stay away from his Kremlin desk until the end of this week. He has in the past interspersed work with lengthy spells at country residences outside Moscow.

His latest visit to Tashkent and Alma-aty, just as his meeting with the military commanders provided ample evidence that all talks about his health problems were not unjustified. He sounded and acted like a sick man, Izvestia said.

The daily warned against allowing petty political figures to gain from the situation and suggested if at all Russia cannot do without a ``regent'', Yeltsin could hand over charge to someone, like he did in the winter of 1996 when he had handed over all his powers to the then prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin before a quintuple heart by pass surgery, he underwent.

``But meanwhile we must leave the presidentalone,'' the daily strongly pleaded and called upon his opponents to stop ``tormenting him and rummaging in his wounds''. ``Adhering to humanity in this case is needed,'' the daily appealed.

Izvestia posed a question: If the president cannot carry out his duties, who should perform them? Who should become a ``regent'' for the ailing ruler? The daily said that at various times different favourites tried to play the role like Anatoly Chubais, Boris Berezovsky and Valentin Yumashev. These are some the names which cropped up in this context, but exclusive closeness to the president may cut short any political career, Izvestia reminded.

It advised the country's statesmen and political figures to wait for just a year more for regular presidential elections. ``A natural and not an artificial island will emerge in Kremlin and then we can prove to ourselves that we are capable of not only changing rules constantly but also sticking to them, for it is necessary at last to set a historical precedentfor timely and legal transfer of power.''

The daily's tone on the entire spectrum on Kremlin occupant's future indicates that new political tremors are in the offing and a strong case is being made for entrusting the head of state's major powers to the ``consensus'' prime minister Yevgeni Primakov, news analysts here feel.