|
|
|
OMRI Daily Digest II, No. 192, 3 October 1995
CONTENTS
[1] FAILED ATTEMPT ON MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT'S LIFE.
[2] GLIGOROV IN BELGRADE.
[3] EU ENDORSES BOSNIAN RECONSTRUCTION PLAN.
[4] FRESH EVIDENCE ON SREBRENICA MASSACRE.
[5] BOSNIAN SERBS ON COUNTEROFFENSIVE.
[6] UN INVESTIGATING APPARENT MASSACRE OF ELDERLY SERBS.
[7] SERBIAN OPPOSITION PARTIES SIGN DECLARATION.
[8] SECOND WAVE OF MASS PRIVATIZATION STARTS IN ROMANIA.
[9] MOLDOVA SIGNS INTERIM TRADE DEAL WITH EU.
[10] COUNCIL OF EUROPE CONCERNED ABOUT DEVELOPMENTS IN MOLDOVA.
[11] HOLBROOKE IN SOFIA. U.S.
[12] GREEK-TURKISH UPDATE.
OMRI DAILY DIGEST
No. 192, Part II, 3 October 1995
SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[1] FAILED ATTEMPT ON MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT'S LIFE.
An attempt to kill Kiro
Gligorov failed on 3 October, AFP reported, citing Macedonian TV. A car bomb
exploded in central Skopje at 9:30 a.m. local time as Gligorov's car drove
by. The president's driver was killed and his security officer and several
other people injured. Gligorov has been admitted to the hospital, where he
is "under medical care." According to Macedonian TV, his life is "not
threatened," but there are contradictory reports about the extent of his
injuries. Two persons have been arrested in connection with the blast.
According to MIC, they were driving a car registered in the Macedonian town
of Titov Veles. All frontier checkpoints have been put on alert. So far, no
one has claimed responsibility for the explosion. -- Stefan Krause, OMRI,
Inc.
[2] GLIGOROV IN BELGRADE.
The previous day, Gligorov had met with his Serbian
counterpart, Slobodan Milosevic, in Belgrade on 2 October, Vecher and Nova
Makedonija reported. Milosevic said he favored "full normalization" of
relations between Macedonia and Greece and between Macedonia and the rump
Yugoslavia "as soon as possible," saying it is "crucial for political
stability in the Balkans." Gligorov called Belgrade and Skopje's mutual
recognition and the establishment of diplomatic relations "essential." He
added that an agreement might be reached in November if a peace accord for
Bosnia-Herzegovina has been reached by then. It was Gligorov's first visit
to Belgrade since Macedonia declared independence in 1991 and the first
meeting between the two presidents since 1993. -- Stefan Krause, OMRI, Inc.
[3] EU ENDORSES BOSNIAN RECONSTRUCTION PLAN.
The European Union foreign
ministers on 2 October backed a French-German initiative for Bosnian
post-war reconstruction, international agencies reported. The EU Commission
is to finalize the details of a plan to rebuild Bosnia by 30 October. This
move reflects growing optimism that U.S. Assistant Secretary of State
Richard Holbrooke's peace initiatives will succeed. It also reveals the EU's
willingness to take the lead on economic reconstruction once peace is
achieved. The EU plan will provide help for refugees, for the reconstruction
of towns destroyed by war, and for the building of economic and
institutional relations between the countries of the former Yugoslavia and
the EU. The EU has said it is willing to foot a third of the bill for
post-war reconstruction, which has been estimated at $4 billion. -- Michael
Mihalka, OMRI, Inc.
[4] FRESH EVIDENCE ON SREBRENICA MASSACRE.
The Christian Science Monitor on 2
October said that one of its reporters has completed interviews with
witnesses of alleged Serbian massacres in July of Muslim males of military
age. He told Monitor Radio that the people agreed on even minor details and
provided information that only someone who had actually seen the site of the
murders could have known. The reporter said some 2,000 men were
machine-gunned and dumped into a mass grave. -- Patrick Moore, OMRI, Inc.
[5] BOSNIAN SERBS ON COUNTEROFFENSIVE.
Beta reported on 2 October that Bosnian
Serb forces are on the move against Bosanska Krupa and Kljuc. International
media said the Bosnian Serbs around Sarajevo released the armored car
carrying the Slovenian ambassador, which they had earlier fired on when it
strayed into their territory by mistake. U.S. negotiator Richard Holbrooke
broke off his marathon cease-fire talks after a session in Sarajevo ended
"inconclusively." The Bosnian government and the Serbs cannot even agree as
to what such a truce would entail. -- Patrick Moore, OMRI, Inc.
[6] UN INVESTIGATING APPARENT MASSACRE OF ELDERLY SERBS.
UN spokesman Chris
Gunness told Reuters on 2 October that the UN is looking into the probable
murder of 12 elderly Serbian civilians in Varivode in Krajina on 28
September. He added that the Croatian authorities for the first time have
acknowledged that a mass killing took place. Serbian civilians said armed
men in military dress had previously looted and torched only abandoned
property but that they were now robbing elderly Serbs in their houses and
killing livestock if the Serbs had no money. -- Patrick Moore, OMRI, Inc.
[7] SERBIAN OPPOSITION PARTIES SIGN DECLARATION.
The opposition Democratic Party
and Democratic Party of Serbia, together with the extraparliamentary Serbian
Liberal Party and United People's Party, have signed a joint political
declaration, Nasa Borba reported on 2 October. To "save the people and the
homeland," they propose replacing the "communist regime" with a democratic
one and the unification of all "Serbian lands and people." It is unclear if
this means the opposition is uniting for the first time since 1990 or if
this is just an attempt to show the opposition is still alive. In another
development, the Hague-based International War Crimes Tribunal for the
Former Yugoslavia has asked Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic to deliver
up indicted war criminals Radovan Karadzic and General Ratko Mladic, Novi
list reported on 2 October. -- Daria Sito Sucic, OMRI, Inc.
[8] SECOND WAVE OF MASS PRIVATIZATION STARTS IN ROMANIA.
The second phase of the
Romanian government's mass privatization program officially started on 2
October, Romanian media reported. Romanians are expected to trade nominal
coupons, as well as vouchers received in 1991, for shares in a company by 31
December. They can also opt to entrust their coupons by 31 March 1996 to one
of the six Private Property Funds, which will act as mutual funds after that
deadline. The exchange of coupons and vouchers for shares will be brokered
by some 1,000 centers. -- Dan Ionescu, OMRI, Inc.
[9] MOLDOVA SIGNS INTERIM TRADE DEAL WITH EU.
European Union foreign ministers
on 2 October signed in Luxembourg an interim trade agreement with the
Republic of Moldova, Reuters reported. The deal includes the economic
aspects of a broader EU-Moldova agreement signed in November 1994 but not
yet ratified. The broader agreement, which paves the way for strengthened
diplomatic, political, and economic ties between the EU and the former
Soviet republic, is similar to agreements concluded by the EU with Russia
and Ukraine. The interim accord focuses on trade and other economic issues.
It provides for tariff cuts and extra aid to be put into effect before the
broader framework for closer relations is implemented. -- Matyas Szabo,
OMRI, Inc.
[10] COUNCIL OF EUROPE CONCERNED ABOUT DEVELOPMENTS IN MOLDOVA.
Vladimir
Solonari, chairman of the Moldovan parliamentary Human Rights and Minorities
Committee, told Infotag on 2 October that deputies of the Council of Europe
Parliamentary Assembly have expressed concern over President Mircea Snegur's
plans to turn Moldova into a "presidential republic." Snegur last week
accused parliamentary leaders of tarnishing his image in a message addressed
to Miguel Angel Martinez, chairman of the CE Parliamentary Assembly,
suggesting that Snegur was seeking to establish dictatorship in Moldova.
Parliamentary chairman Petru Lucinschi responded that the letter to Martinez
was a brief, purely factual overview of the political situation in Moldova.
-- Dan Ionescu, OMRI, Inc.
[11] HOLBROOKE IN SOFIA. U.S.
Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke
visited Sofia on 1-2 October to brief Bulgarian politicians on the peace
process in Bosnia and to discuss U.S.-Bulgarian relations, RFE/RL and
Bulgarian newspapers reported. He met with President Zhelyu Zhelev, Prime
Minister Zhan Videnov, and Foreign Minister Georgi Pirinski. Holbrooke said
Bulgaria has made significant sacrifices in enforcing sanctions against rump
Yugoslavia and that the U.S. will bear in mind any sacrifices by so-called
front-line states when it comes to post-war reconstruction programs. He
added that Bulgaria "will play an important role in reconstructing the
Balkan region after [the end of] the Yugoslav conflict." On Bulgaria's
possible NATO membership, Holbrooke said the country must "decide what it
wishes to do in terms of its future orientation in Europe." -- Stefan
Krause, OMRI, Inc.
[12] GREEK-TURKISH UPDATE.
Vessels from Greece and Turkey took part in a military
exercise in the Aegean Sea for the first time since 1974, AFP reported on 2
October. Greek government spokesman Tylemachos Hytiris said a Greek, a
Turkish, a Dutch, and a U.S. warship took part in a "technical exercise"
organized on the sidelines of NATO's Partnership for Peace maneuvers in the
Black Sea. Greece had previously boycotted NATO exercises in the Aegean Sea
in protest at the Turkish occupation of northern Cyprus in 1974 and because
of disputes over the delineation of territorial waters in the Aegean Sea
between Athens and Ankara. Hytiris also announced that Greece is sending a
relief team to southeastern Turkey, where at least 71 people were killed by
an earthquake on 1 October. -- Stefan Krause, OMRI, Inc.
This material was reprinted with permission of the Open Media Research Institute, a nonprofit organization with research offices in Prague, Czech Republic.
For more information on OMRI publications please write to [email protected]
|
