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OMRI Daily Digest II, No. 194, 5 October 1995
CONTENTS
[1] UPDATE ON MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT'S CONDITION.
[2] ACTING MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT NAMED.
[3] MACEDONIAN POLITICIANS PLEDGE CONTINUITY.
[4] NATO JETS HIT SERBIAN MISSILE SITES.
[5] BATTLEFIELD UPDATE.
[6] MONTENEGRIN NEWS.
[7] CROATIAN AUTHORITIES CLOSE DOWN BILINGUAL SCHOOLS.
[8] DIFFICULTIES FACED BY CROATIAN SERB REFUGEES.
[9] ROMANIAN RULING PARTY RESPONDS TO EXTREMISTS.
[10] ROMANIANS SEEK FREE MOVEMENT WITHIN EU.
[11] MOLDOVAN PARLIAMENT APPEALS FOR RELEASE OF POLITICAL PRISONERS.
[12] BULGARIA REAFFIRMS INTENTION TO RESTART NUCLEAR REACTOR.
OMRI DAILY DIGEST
No. 194, Part II, 5 October 1995
SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[1] UPDATE ON MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT'S CONDITION.
Two days after the attempt
on his life, Kiro Gligorov is still in a serious and "delicate"
condition, according to international agencies. An official statement
says his situation is stable but he remains in intensive care following
a six-hour operation in which shrapnel and two blood clots were removed
from his brain. According to unconfirmed reports, Gligorov lost his
right eye. Macedonian Radio on 4 October said surgeons were fighting to
save his sight. Western diplomats were cited as saying they do not
expect Gligorov to return to office even if he recovers. Meanwhile,
about 150 people have been questioned in connection with the
assassination attempt and some detained, AFP reported. There is
speculation that extreme Macedonian nationalists may have planted the
bomb to protest the Greek-Macedonian accord, which provides for a change
of the Macedonian flag and parts of the constitution. -- Stefan Krause
[2] ACTING MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT NAMED.
Parliamentary chairman Stojan Andov--
who is also head of the Liberal Party, the second largest force in the
governing coalition--was named acting president of Macedonia on 4
October, Flaka reported the following day. According to the Macedonian
Constitution, the parliamentary chairman takes over as acting president
if the elected president dies, resigns, or is incapacitated. The
constitution also stipulates that presidential elections must take place
within 40 days if the elected president's mandate is terminated for
whatever reason. The New York Times on 5 October cited U.S. diplomat
Victor Comas as saying Andov is pro-Western and committed to a market
economy. The same report, however, quotes unnamed diplomats and
Macedonian sources as saying that Andov lacks Gligorov's "political
wisdom, flexibility, and popularity." -- Stefan Krause
[3] MACEDONIAN POLITICIANS PLEDGE CONTINUITY.
Macedonian Foreign Minister
Stevo Crvenkovski on 4 October said the attempt on Gligorov will not
mean a change in Macedonian politics, AFP reported the same day.
Crvenkovski, addressing the UN General Assembly, called the attempt a
"deliberate political act" aimed at destabilizing the country. He said
it would not "under any circumstances force us to change our course" of
democratization and good relations with all neighbors. Meanwhile, the
first round of direct Greek-Macedonian talks ended in Athens on 4
October without concrete results but in a "constructive atmosphere,"
according to both sides. Talks will resume in Skopje on 10 October. --
Stefan Krause
[4] NATO JETS HIT SERBIAN MISSILE SITES.
International media reported on 4
October that NATO jets hit Bosnian Serb radar and SAM sites in southern
and central Bosnia in the first such action since air strikes were
suspended on 20 September. The pilots found that the Serbs had locked
onto them while the jets were on a routine patrol to enforce the "no-fly
zone." Nikola Koljevic, the Bosnian Serb "vice president," told Reuters
that the attacks were "a definite step back in the peace process."
Meanwhile on the diplomatic front, U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke said he
had a "serious proposal" from the Bosnian government for a ceasefire but
gave no details. Sarajevo and Pale have very different understandings of
what a truce would involve. -- Patrick Moore
[5] BATTLEFIELD UPDATE.
Both the Serbs and the Bosnian government reported
success at the front on 4 October. Slobodna Dalmacija the following day
said that Serbian forces were continuing their counteroffensive in
western Bosnia and that fighting was particularly intense around Otoka
and Bosanska Krupa along the Una River between Bihac and the Croatian
border. Bosnian government troops of the Mostar-based Fourth Corps
reported that they had driven the Serbs off key heights near the
Sarajevo-Trnovo road and were controlling the road between Konjic and
Kalinovik, the home town of Bosnian Serb commander General Ratko Mladic,
news agencies said. -- Patrick Moore
[6] MONTENEGRIN NEWS.
Montena-fax on 4 October reported that the previous
day some 25 tons of humanitarian aid from Russia, consisting largely of
medical supplies, arrived in Podgorica. In other news, ATA reported that
Albanian officials on 1 October detained a tanker carrying some 9,000
liters of contraband fuel destined for Montenegro. This last seizure
brings the total amount of smuggled fuel seized over the past two months
to some 50,000 liters. -- Stan Markotich
[7] CROATIAN AUTHORITIES CLOSE DOWN BILINGUAL SCHOOLS.
Croatian media have
recently been reporting extensively on the Ministry of Education's
decision in late September to replace the two-language curriculum of
three secondary schools in Zagreb with a one-language curriculum. In
explaining this decision, which encountered bitter reactions from
students, parents, and teachers, the ministry said the schools were
"experimental" but that the experiment had failed. Critics suspect that
the real reason for the decision is a myopic attempt at combatting the
brain drain of a country that lives from tourism, shipping, and emigre
remittances. The head of one school who supported the two-language
curriculum was accused of manipulating the students for political
reasons and was fired, Novi list reported on 5 October. Minister of
Education Ljilja Vokic has stressed that the Croatian authorities want
to have strong control over the country's education system. -- Daria
Sito Sucic
[8] DIFFICULTIES FACED BY CROATIAN SERB REFUGEES.
According to recent
Serbian media reports, between 6,000 and 7,000 Croatian Serb refugees
want to return home but are prevented from doing so by bureaucratic
wranglings. The Serbian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has stopped issuing
collective passports for refugees, while the Croatian Government Office
in Belgrade, which handles humanitarian issues, claims it has no
instructions from Zagreb on how to deal with refugees wanting to return.
Meanwhile, the Croatian government has set a deadline for those who have
left to come back and claim their property. In related news, Croatia's
admission into the Council of Europe, as well as EU post-war aid to
Croatia, has been made conditional on the resolution of the problem of
the refugees and their property. The UN Security Council on 4 October
expressed its "deepest concern" about the status of Croatian Serb
refugees, Novi List reported on 5 October. -- Daria Sito Sucic
[9] ROMANIAN RULING PARTY RESPONDS TO EXTREMISTS.
The Party of Social
Democracy in Romania (PDSR), in a 4 October letter addressed to the
leadership of the chauvinistic Greater Romania Party (PRM), has
denounced the recent "attacks of unprecedented virulence" launched by
PRM Chairman Corneliu Vadim Tudor against President Ion Iliescu. In a
pamphlet published with the PRM mouthpiece Romania mare, Tudor accused
Iliescu of being "a brash dictator" and a "protector of impertinent
Zionists." He also commented that the president has "delivered the
country to the Jews." Tudor's reaction was provoked by Iliescu's
statement during his recent visit to the U.S. that Tudor and Gheorghe
Funar, the leader of the Party of Romanian National Unity, were
"Romanian Zhirinovskys." The PDSR's letter, which was broadcast by Radio
Bucharest, stressed that Tudor's attacks have ""seriously affected"
cooperation between the two parties. -- Dan Ionescu
[10] ROMANIANS SEEK FREE MOVEMENT WITHIN EU.
Lazar Comanescu, a spokesman for
the Romanian Foreign Ministry, has said Romania insists on unrestricted
travel within the EU for its citizens, Radio Bucharest reported on 4
October. He said Romania will bring up this issue at all talks with EU
representatives by pointing to the principle of equal treatment and
opportunities for all EU associate members. Jacques Santier, president
of the European Commission, has stressed the necessity to find a
solution to this problem, Comanescu added. Comanescu's statement was an
indirect response to the EU's recent decision to extend visa
requirements to Romania, along with some other 100 countries blacklisted
as posing a security or immigration threat to the EU. -- Matyas Szabo
[11] MOLDOVAN PARLIAMENT APPEALS FOR RELEASE OF POLITICAL PRISONERS.
The
Moldovan parliament has asked that diplomatic efforts be stepped up in
order to free the members of the so-called "Ilascu group" from a
Tiraspol jail, BASA-press and Infotag reported on 4 October. The four
men were sentenced to various prison terms for allegedly committing
terrorists acts during the 1992 armed conflict between Moldova and the
breakaway Dniester region. The parliament resolution, which denounces
the "mediaeval practices" of the Dniester authorities, was adopted at
the initiative of the opposition Christian Democratic Popular Front. The
front's leaders have repeatedly accused the Chisinau government of
failing to drum up international support for liberating the four
political prisoners. -- Dan Ionescu
[12] BULGARIA REAFFIRMS INTENTION TO RESTART NUCLEAR REACTOR.
RFE/RL and
Bulgarian newspapers report that Bulgaria has officially reaffirmed its
intention to restart the controversial Reactor No. 1 at the Kozloduy
nuclear power plant despite international objections. Director of the
Bulgarian Atomic Energy Agency Yanko Yanev said an agreement has been
reached with the International Atomic Energy Agency to shut off the unit
after the winter for further examination. Deputy Prime Minister and
Minister of Trade Kiril Tsochev met with the EU's representative to
Bulgaria to deliver Bulgaria's official position on the issue. The
official statement says that Bulgaria is one of the few countries that
has a legal framework regulating the use of atomic energy and has
ratified the convention on nuclear safety. Bulgarian papers cited
Tsochev as saying he wishes France "would not conduct nuclear tests in
Muroroa and then take on problems like our reactor." -- Stefan Krause
This material was reprinted with permission of the Open Media Research Institute, a nonprofit organization with research offices in Prague, Czech Republic.
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