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OMRI Daily Digest, Vol. 2, No. 198, 96-10-11
From: Open Media Research Institute <http://www.omri.cz>
Vol. 2, No. 198, 11 October 1996
CONTENTS
[A] TRANSCAUCASIA AND CENTRAL ASIA
[01] UN ENVOY MEETS ARDZINBA.
[02] RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTRY CONDEMNS "ANTI-RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN" BY GEORGIAN
PARLIAMENT.
[03] BAKU-SUPSA PIPELINE TO BE OPERATIONAL BY LATE 1988?
[04] TURKMENISTAN CONDEMNS CRITICISM OF TALIBAN.
[05] TAJIK OPPOSITION LEADER ON TALIBAN.
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[06] HARASSMENT OF MUSLIM RETURNEES IN REPUBLIKA SRPSKA.
[07] BOSNIAN ROUNDUP.
[08] BONN AND BELGRADE AGREE ON RETURN OF REFUGEES.
[09] SERBIA AND CROATIA FIGHT OVER ETHNIC MINORITY IDENTITY.
[10] UN DOUBTFUL ABOUT DECEMBER ELECTIONS IN EASTERN SLAVONIA.
[11] CROATIAN JOURNALISTS' ACQUITTAL APPEALED.
[12] SLOVENIAN PRESIDENT SAYS ALL EX-YUGOSLAV REPUBLICS SHARE SUCCESSION
EQUALLY.
[13] MACEDONIAN ALBANIANS PROTEST MYSTERIOUS POISONINGS.
[14] ROMANIA'S RESPONSES TO EU QUESTIONNAIRE REVIEWED.
[15] DNIESTER FACTORIES MANUFACTURING ARMS.
[16] BULGARIAN MEDICAL WORKERS LAUNCH PROTESTS.
[17] WORLD BANK TIES LOAN TO CLOSURES OF BULGARIAN ENTERPRISES.
[18] ALBANIAN LOCAL ELECTION UPDATE.
[A] TRANSCAUCASIA AND CENTRAL ASIA
[01] UN ENVOY MEETS ARDZINBA.
The UN special envoy for Abkhazia, Eduard Brunner, held talks in Sukhumi on 10
October with Abkhaz President Vladislav Ardzinba, ITAR-TASS reported. Speaking
to journalists afterwards, Brunner stressed the importance of finding a
political solution to the problem of Abkhazia's future political status vis-a-
vis Tbilisi, and of expediting the return of ethnic Georgians who were
displaced during the fighting in 1992-1993. Tensions between Tbilisi and
Sukhumi have escalated in recent weeks following the decision of the Abkhaz
parliament--denounced as illegitimate by the Georgian government--to hold a
parliamentary election on 23 November. -- Liz Fuller
[02] RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTRY CONDEMNS "ANTI-RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN" BY GEORGIAN
PARLIAMENT.
The Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on 10 October condemning the
Georgian parliament's 2 October resolution calling for a fundamental revision
of Georgian-Russian relations, including the scrapping of an agreement on
Russian military bases in Georgia, ITAR-TASS reported. The statement rejected
what it termed an attempt to question both the expediency of having Russian
peacekeepers on the Georgian-Abkhaz border, and Russia's ability to mediate a
settlement of the conflict. -- Liz Fuller
[03] BAKU-SUPSA PIPELINE TO BE OPERATIONAL BY LATE 1988?
At a meeting in Baku on 9 October with Azerbaijani President Heidar Aliev,
Terry Adams, the president of the Azerbaijani International Operating Company,
announced that the Baku-Supsa pipeline to export Azerbaijan's Caspian Sea oil
by the so-called "Western route" to the Georgian Black Sea coast will be
operational "by late 1998," Turan reported. A pipeline construction tender
will be announced early next year. On 9 October Adams said the Russian route
for early oil will start to be used in August 1997. -- Liz Fuller
[04] TURKMENISTAN CONDEMNS CRITICISM OF TALIBAN.
A spokesman at the Turkmen Embassy in Moscow said Ashgabat does not agree with
the CIS member states that condemned the Taliban militia at last week's Almaty
summit, according to the Journal of Commerce on 10 October. The spokesman
said Taliban have offered security guarantees for a projected $2 billion
natural gas pipeline that would run from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to
Pakistan, in which the U.S. firm UNOCAL and Saudi Arabia's Delta are involved.
-- Lowell Bezanis
[05] TAJIK OPPOSITION LEADER ON TALIBAN.
One of the leaders of the United Tajik Opposition (UTO), Ali Akbar Turajonzoda,
played down accusations about UTO connections with Afghanistan's Taliban
movement in an 11 October Nezavisimaya gazeta article. Turajonzoda said the
UTO was "distressed" at Russian Security Council Secretary Aleksandr Lebed's
statement that the Taliban would ally itself with the UTO and move into areas
of Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. He said that the UTO has a neutral policy to the
Afghan conflict, and remarked that "the Afghans have so many internal
problems...that planning foreign aggression is simply not serious." -- Bruce
Pannier
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[06] HARASSMENT OF MUSLIM RETURNEES IN REPUBLIKA SRPSKA.
There were numerous explosions of unidentified origin in houses in three
formerly Muslim villages now on Bosnian Serb territory on 10 October, BBC
reported. The villages are Mumbasic and Stanic Rijeka near Tuzla, and Kordoni
near Zvornik, all in northern Bosnia, Reuters added. No injuries or casualties
were reported. Tensions have risen along Bosnia's inter-entity border in
recent weeks as Muslim refugees seek to return to their homes in the Republika
Srpska. They have received a less than warm welcome from the Serbs as well as
from IFOR, which views the Muslims as troublemakers. Some 223 Muslims have
gone back to Jusici near Zvornik, Onasa stated. They burned a Serbian flag
after Bosnian Serb and UN police confiscated weapons from them, Nasa Borba
reported on 11 October. Meanwhile, the Muslim Party of Democratic Action in
Sarajevo promised to help the residents of Jusici rebuild their homes,
Onasa reported on 10 October. The Muslim governing party also plans to open
branch offices in the Republika Srpska, where it is the second-largest party
in parliament. -- Patrick Moore
[07] BOSNIAN ROUNDUP.
The international community's High Representative Carl Bildt said an
international military presence will be required in Bosnia for another two
years to consolidate peace and deter any new fighting, BBC reported on 10
October. Also in London, the International Contact Group warned the Serbs to
stop boycotting the joint presidency lest they lose their share of
reconstruction aid. In New York, the UN Security Council protested the lack of
progress in investigating the fate of missing persons and singled out the
Bosnian Serb authorities as obstructing efforts. At the Laniste cave near
Kljuc in western Bosnia, government officials have removed 70 bodies of
Muslims believed to have been killed by Serbs on 1 June 1992. Among the
gruesome discoveries have been severed heads pierced with nails, news agencies
noted. -- Patrick Moore
[08] BONN AND BELGRADE AGREE ON RETURN OF REFUGEES.
Germany will send back 135,000 refugees to the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
over the next three years, according to an agreement signed by the two
countries' interior ministers on 10 October, Reuters reported. Most of the
refugees are Kosovar Albanians. German Interior Minister Manfred Kanther said
the agreement would send a signal to anyone contemplating coming to Germany,
adding that "Germany is not a land for immigrants." Both ministers claimed the
return would not be connected with German economic aid to Belgrade. The
agreement came one day after Bavaria deported the first of 320,000 Bosnian
refugees. Also, the state of Berlin said it would start deporting people to
Bosnia this month. German human-rights groups accused the government of
sending people into unsafe situations and of trying to win votes from the
radical nationalist right. In Bonn, several hundred Kosovar Albanian refugees
protested outside the Interior Ministry, Reuters reported. -- Fabian
Schmidt
[09] SERBIA AND CROATIA FIGHT OVER ETHNIC MINORITY IDENTITY.
Hido Biscevic, an aide to the Croatian foreign minister, protested Serbian
Vice Premier Ratko Markovic's recent statement that Backa Croats, known as
Bunjevci, "are neither Croats nor Serbs, but only Bunjevci," and would receive
the status of a nation in Serbia, Vjesnik reported on 11 October. Hungarian
Croats had earlier protested Markovic's statement that the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia was the "motherland" of Bunjevci living in Hungary. Hungarian
Croats issued a statement that the Bunjevci are Croats and of the same origin
as Croats in Lika, Croatian Primorje, and Dalmatia, Hina reported on 4
October; they speak Croatian, use the Latin script, and belong to the Roman
Catholic Church. According to Hina, Serbian authorities first devised the new
national group "Bunjevci" for a 1991 census. -- Daria Sito Sucic
[10] UN DOUBTFUL ABOUT DECEMBER ELECTIONS IN EASTERN SLAVONIA.
Croatia's demand for early elections in the last Serb-held enclave in the
country probably cannot be met, Derek Boothby, deputy administrator of the UN
Transitional Authority in Eastern Slavonia (UNTAES), told Reuters on 10
October. Although Croatian leaders and UNTAES administrator Jacques Klein
agreed the area should be reverted to Croatian control by spring 1997, Boothby
said conditions for free and fair elections can't be met by 15 December, the
election date proposed by the Croatian government. The balloting must be
conducted 30 days before the UN mandate ends, which is yet to be decided by
the UN Security Council. -- Daria Sito Sucic
[11] CROATIAN JOURNALISTS' ACQUITTAL APPEALED.
Croatia's state prosecutor on 10 October appealed against the acquittal of two
independent journalists from the satirical weekly Feral Tribune who were
charged with defaming President Franjo Tudjman, Reuters and Hina reported.
Their acquittal was seen as a boost for press freedom in Croatia, whose
acceptance into the Council of Europe was delayed partly due to the
government's grip on media. But the state prosecutor has requested the
annulment of that verdict, citing errors in the municipal court's proceedings.
Meanwhile, the state-run daily Vjesnik ran an article on media freedom on 11
October suggesting the media situation in Croatia is not significantly
different than in other Western countries, claiming that "nobody in Croatia so
far has suggested a discussion about serious limitations of media freedom." --
Daria Sito Sucic
[12] SLOVENIAN PRESIDENT SAYS ALL EX-YUGOSLAV REPUBLICS SHARE SUCCESSION
EQUALLY.
Milan Kucan told the Montenegrin weekly Monitor that all six former
republics have equal claim to the succession of Yugoslavia dating from 1918,
Onasa reported on 10 October. He thus challenged Serbia-Montenegro's claim to
the sole right of succession under the name Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and
hence to the former federation's wealth and assets. Kucan said Slovenia had
paid huge sums of money for the Yugoslav People's Army, which were put to
"woefully wrongful, unfortunate, and tragic purposes." -- Patrick
Moore
[13] MACEDONIAN ALBANIANS PROTEST MYSTERIOUS POISONINGS.
Thousands of protesters in Tetovo demanded the resignation of health minister
Ilija Filipce on 10 October in connection with alleged poisonings of Albanian
children in local schools. The demonstrators also yelled: "Down with the
government, down with (President Kiro) Gligorov," Reuters reported. Party for
Democratic Prosperity leader Abdurrahman Aliti warned that violence may break
out if the alleged culprits are not caught. Within two weeks around 500 ethnic
Albanian pupils sought treatment for headaches, upset stomachs, and limb pains,
but it remains unclear what was causing the illnesses. Most children recovered
after several days of vitamin treatment. Filipce had visited Tetovo on 9
October and said the Vienna Forensic Institute found no signs of poisoning.
Police are, however, investigating the possibility. The incident comes at a
time of rising tensions in the run-up to local elections on 17 November. --
Fabian Schmidt
[14] ROMANIA'S RESPONSES TO EU QUESTIONNAIRE REVIEWED.
During a 10 October meeting of the EU-Romania Association Council, EU
representatives were critical of certain "weak points" in Romania's response
to the questionnaire given to all applicants for EU membership, Radio
Bucharest reported on 11 October. They nonetheless emphasized that
"preparations for joining the union had not been affected, despite the fact
that this is an electoral year [in Romania]." There were no signals that the
EU was moving toward abolishing visa requirements for Romanian tourists. Also
in Brussels, an agreement on setting up a Post-Privatization Fund was signed
on 10 October. The fund will be financed by the EU's PHARE program (15 million
ECU) and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (25 million ECU)
and will operate for ten years. -- Michael Shafir
[15] DNIESTER FACTORIES MANUFACTURING ARMS.
A newspaper in the Dniester breakaway region has confirmed reports that
factories there are manufacturing arms, BASA-Press reported on 10 October.
Pridnestrovye, the Tiraspol leadership's official newspaper, wrote that the
munitions being produced include Grad jet-rocket equipment, claiming it is
needed to maintain the balance of forces with Moldova's army. There were
earlier reports in the Chisinau press about arms production at the Pribor
plant in Tighina, quoting Moldovan representatives to the Joint Control
Commission. Moldovan Defense Ministry officials said Pribor produces
simplified Grad equipment. -- Zsolt Mato
[16] BULGARIAN MEDICAL WORKERS LAUNCH PROTESTS.
The medical workers' organization within the Confederation of Independent
Trade Unions in Bulgaria began a petition drive demanding Health Minister Mimi
Vitkova's resignation for aggravating the impoverishment of medical staff and
hospitals in Bulgaria, Trud reported on 11 October. The union, representing
thousands of doctors and other medical personnel, also staged protest meetings
in Sofia and 11 other towns and hung black banners from the windows of some
hospitals. Most medical workers are not paid regularly and receive less than
the national average salary of about $70 monthly. For several months patients
have had to bring their own bed sheets and food for hospital stays. The
Plovdiv hospital recently started charging patients in hard currency in an
attempt to avoid closure from lack of funds (see OMRI Daily Digest, 2
October 1996). -- Maria Koinova
[17] WORLD BANK TIES LOAN TO CLOSURES OF BULGARIAN ENTERPRISES.
The World Bank is likely to approve a major new loan to Bulgaria for balance-
of-payments support by the end of year, Pieter Stek, the World Bank's recently
appointed executive director responsible for Bulgaria, said in Sofia on 9
October. But Stek stressed the urgency of liquidating the 64 enterprises
Bulgaria promised on 15 May to close, Bulgarian media reported. Agriculture
Minister Krastyo Trendafilov said legal proceedings were 99% complete at 18
agricultural and food-industry firms on the list, eight of which will be
bought by private interests and another four or five of which will have their
assets sold off. Industry Minister Lyubomir Dachev said that of the 38
industrial firms on the list, five had been privatized successfully, 10
declared bankrupt, and 14 were subject to a second judicial decision because
of problems with the initial method selected for their closure. -- Michael
Wyzan
[18] ALBANIAN LOCAL ELECTION UPDATE.
The Central Election Commission decided at a 10 October meeting that the
opposition will be allowed to participate in the monitoring of all aspects of
the election process, Koha Jone reported. A special envoy for Italian
Foreign Minister Lamberto Dini said Italy would send 150 election monitors,
Albania reported. In other news, the Party of National Unity protested the
imprisonment of its leader Idajet Beqiri, calling him a "victim of political
revenge," Poli i Qendres reported. Beqiri was sentenced on 28 September for
crimes against humanity committed as a judge and communist party leader in the
town of Kruja. -- Fabian Schmidt
Compiled by Victor Gomez and Tom Warner
News and information as of 1200 CET
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].
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