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OMRI Daily Digest, Vol. 2, No. 126, 96-06-28
From: Open Media Research Institute <http://www.omri.cz>
Vol. 2, No. 126, 28 June 1996
CONTENTS
[A] TRANSCAUCASIA AND CENTRAL ASIA
[01] KAZAKHSTAN'S PARLIAMENT AMNESTIES 20,000 PRISONERS.
[02] OPEN SOCIETY INSTITUTE OPENS OFFICE IN UZBEKISTAN.
[03] TAJIK OPPOSITION NEGOTIATORS RETURN TO DUSHANBE.
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[04] UNLESS GRANTED "GUARANTEES," KARADZIC WILL RUN IN ELECTIONS.
[05] SERBIAN RADICALS BACK KARADZIC.
[06] UPDATE ON THE HAGUE HEARINGS ON KARADZIC, MLADIC.
[07] WAR CRIMES TRIBUNAL INDICTS RAPE SUSPECTS.
[08] BOSNIAN FEDERATION AND REPUBLIKA SRPSKA SIGN PAYMENT SYSTEM AGREEMENT.
[09] BOSNIAN SERB GENERAL SEES POSSIBILITY FOR RENEWED FIGHTING.
[10] CROATIAN UPDATE.
[11] ROMANIAN OPPOSITION LEADER LAUNCHES PRESIDENTIAL PROGRAM.
[12] RUSSIAN, MOLDOVAN PRESIDENTS WANT DNIESTER ACCORD SIGNED SOON.
[13] NEW PRICE HIKES IN BULGARIA.
[14] CONTROVERSY OVER APPOINTMENT OF TOP BULGARIAN JUDGES.
[15] GREECE BRUSHES ASIDE BULGARIAN CONCERNS OVER POMAKS.
[A] TRANSCAUCASIA AND CENTRAL ASIA
[01] KAZAKHSTAN'S PARLIAMENT AMNESTIES 20,000 PRISONERS.
Faced with reduced funds for prison upkeep, the upper house of Kazakhstan's
parliament declared an amnesty for nearly 20,000 prisoners convicted of non-
violent crimes, or about one-quarter of all prisoners in the country, RFE/RL
reported on 26 June. Interior Minister Kairbek Suleimenov reported that some 1,
270 prisoners died last year of tuberculosis, caused by malnutrition, shortage
of medication and overcrowding, and about 540 have died so far this year.
Suleimenov complained that his ministry received less than half the $650,000
needed to look after Kazakhstan's 77,000 prisoners. Kazakhstan's penal system
and treatment of prisoners have come under attack by international
organizations. -- Bhavna Dave
[02] OPEN SOCIETY INSTITUTE OPENS OFFICE IN UZBEKISTAN.
An office of the Open Society Institute, established by George Soros in 1993,
opened in Tashkent on 26 June, ITAR-TASS reported the following day. The
office will distribute information about the Open Society Institute, offer
scholarships to young people for studies in Western educational institutions,
and promote international contacts in the educational sphere. Sharon Weiss,
the U.S. Deputy Ambassador to Uzbekistan, noted that this event was further
evidence of the U.S. offer of friendship to Uzbekistan. The inauguration
coincided with President Islam Karimov's visit to the U.S. The Open Society
Institute is to open centers in Tajikistan, Armenia, and Mongolia in the near
future. -- Bhavna Dave
[03] TAJIK OPPOSITION NEGOTIATORS RETURN TO DUSHANBE.
With inter-Tajik peace talks expected to resume sometime in July, the Tajik
opposition on 27 June sent a new team to Dushanbe to monitor the ceasefire,
ITAR-TASS reported. The Tajik opposition has not been represented on the
monitoring commission since the disappearance of its co-chairman, Zafar
Rakhmonov, in early March. Rakhmonov's whereabouts are still unknown. The new
four-man team was allowed to cross into Tajikistan from neighboring
Afghanistan. The UN special representative to Tajikistan, Gerd Merrem, will
meet with United Tajik Opposition (UTO) leader Said Abdullo Nuri in Kabul,
then fly on to Dushanbe to meet with the new UTO representatives there. --
Bruce Pannier
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[04] UNLESS GRANTED "GUARANTEES," KARADZIC WILL RUN IN ELECTIONS.
Unless the Republika Srpska's (RS) international recognition is guaranteed,
Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic will run in the forthcoming elections and
win, he said at the 27 June session of the Serb Democratic Party's (SDS)
steering committee, Nasa Borba reported. The daily also reported that
posters of Karadzic as the SDS candidate appeared in the Bosnian Serb
stronghold of Pale as a part of the SDS's pre-election campaign. However, U.S.
Assistant Secretary of State John Kornblum said in Sarajevo the same day that
the U.S. will accept no conditions on Karadzic's resignation. "He must now
quickly bow to the pressure of the international community, ... leave office
and go to The Hague," AFP quoted him as saying. -- Daria Sito Sucic
[05] SERBIAN RADICALS BACK KARADZIC.
The Serbian Radical Party (SRS), led by accused war criminal Vojislav Seselj,
remains Karadzic's most vocal supporter within rump Yugoslavia. Nasa Borba
reported on 28 June that Seselj has almost unconditionally backed a Karadzic
run for the Bosnian Serb presidency. According to the daily, Seselj has said
that the SRS in the Republika Srpska would "[even] endorse Karadzic and ...
withdraw their own candidate." -- Stan Markotich
[06] UPDATE ON THE HAGUE HEARINGS ON KARADZIC, MLADIC.
Week-long hearings on the cases against Karadzic and his military counterpart
Gen. Ratko Mladic, both of whom are charged with genocide and crimes against
humanity (see ), started on 27 June in The Hague. Karadzic's Belgrade lawyer,
Igor Pantelic, appeared before the court and requested to listen to
proceedings and be given access to the documents prepared by the prosecutor's
office, Nasa Borba reported. The latter request was rejected as
contradicting tribunal rules. After the proceedings, Pantelic said he was
quitting because he found the court's treatment unfair. Meanwhile, the
tribunal's prosecution office presented evidence against the Republika Srpska
and rump Yugoslavia for not arresting the two accused despite having had
"numerous chances," and called for the tribunal president to officially inform
the UN Security Council of the two countries' non-cooperation. -- Daria Sito
Sucic
[07] WAR CRIMES TRIBUNAL INDICTS RAPE SUSPECTS.
Seventeen more people, including nine ethnic Croats accused of taking part in
attacks against Muslim settlements and massacres against Muslim civilians and
eight ethnic Serbs accused of taking part in mass rapes of Muslim women, have
been indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia,
Nasa Borba reported on 28 June. According to various reports, the indicted
Serbs took prisoners, some as young as twelve years old, near the southeast
Bosnian town of Foca between April 1992 and February 1993, where they were
enslaved, beaten, and forced to work in make-shift brothels. The indictments
represent the The Hague tribunal's first attempt to deal with rapes as war
crimes. -- Stan Markotich
[08] BOSNIAN FEDERATION AND REPUBLIKA SRPSKA SIGN PAYMENT SYSTEM AGREEMENT.
Representatives of Bosnia-Herzegovina's two entities signed an agreement on 26
June on connecting their two existing payment systems, Nasa Borba reported.
Radio Sarajevo reported that the payment system will use German marks, and
will be operational at the beginning of the next week. -- Daria Sito
Sucic
[09] BOSNIAN SERB GENERAL SEES POSSIBILITY FOR RENEWED FIGHTING.
Bosnian Serb Gen. Manojlo Milovanovic, speaking to local radio in Pale on 26
June, did not rule out the possibility for renewed conflicts in Bosnia and
Herzegovina. Dubbing the existing peace in the country "unstable," Milovanovic
said the Bosnian Serb military's priorities include "maintaining and equipping
the army ... [and] the welfare of our soldiers," allegedly because "the very
survival of the Republika Srpska depends [on such factors]." The general timed
his remarks to coincide with his message for Vidovdan, the 28 June Serb
holiday marking the loss to Ottoman invaders in 1389. In an unrelated
development, John Kornblum said in Sarajevo on 27 June that the U.S. will not
give military aid to the Bosnian Federation until a controversial draft bill
uniting the Muslim and Croat armed forces in Bosnia is made law, AFP reported.
-- Stan Markotich and Daria Sito Sucic
[10] CROATIAN UPDATE.
The Justice Ministry has published the names of over 800 ethnic Serbs alleged
to have committed war crimes between the time of the rebel Serb uprising in
Croatia in 1991 and 1995, AFP reported on 27 June. Cases have been opened
against some 299 of those named; the report also observed that the list is not
"exhaustive." Those named will be exempted from an amnesty recently offered to
rebel Serbs by President Franjo Tudjman. In another development, UN Secretary-
General Boutros Boutros Ghali recommended on 27 June that the UN peacekeeping
mission in Slavonia be extended until 15 January, Reuters reported. The
mandate for the UN Transitional Authority in Eastern Slavonia, headed by U.S.
diplomat Jacques Klein, expires on 30 July. -- Stan Markotich
[11] ROMANIAN OPPOSITION LEADER LAUNCHES PRESIDENTIAL PROGRAM.
The leader of the Democratic Convention of Romania (CDR), Emil Constantinescu,
launched his platform on 27 June for the upcoming presidential elections,
Radio Bucharest reported. According to Constantinescu, the key ideas of the
program are that the next president should be a president for all Romanians,
and able to lead the country to a top position among East European states. The
president, he added, should be the guarantor of law and order and stay in
permanent touch with the government without interfering with its authority.
Constantinescu vowed to speed up privatization and encourage both domestic
capital and foreign investment. The formal presidential campaign will not
begin for another three months. -- Dan Ionescu
[12] RUSSIAN, MOLDOVAN PRESIDENTS WANT DNIESTER ACCORD SIGNED SOON.
Boris Yeltsin hopes a memorandum on the settlement of the Dniester conflict
can be signed in Moscow in early July, a Russian presidential adviser said in
Chisinau on 27 June. The foreign-policy adviser, Dmitrii Ryurikov, is
accompanying Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Boris Pastukhov on a visit in
Moldova, Infotag and BASA-press reported. At a meeting with the two officials,
Moldovan President Mircea Snegur stressed the importance of having the accord
signed without delay. But he warned that a majority of Moldovans "do not
accept confederalization and are against Moldova's [territorial] division."
Snegur urged experts to draft a less ambiguous definition of the Dniester
region's future legal status. -- Dan Ionescu
[13] NEW PRICE HIKES IN BULGARIA.
The government on 27 June announced a new round of price hikes effective on 1
July, Trud reported. Fuel prices will go up by 15%, after a 79.5% hike just
one month ago. Cigarettes prices are expected to rise by 30%-300%, while
alcohol will be subject to an excise duty of up to 50%. A new import tax of 5%
also becomes effective on 1 July, as does a VAT hike from 18% to 22%. The new
taxes and duties are part of an austerity package worked out in cooperation
with the IMF. The fuel-price hike is expected to result in an increase of
virtually all other prices. Electricity prices will also go up on 1 July.
According to Kontinent, they will at least double. -- Stefan Krause
[14] CONTROVERSY OVER APPOINTMENT OF TOP BULGARIAN JUDGES.
The Socialist daily Duma blasted President Zhelyu Zhelev's 27 June
appointments to two top Bulgarian courts as "scandalous and anti-constitutional."
Demokratsiya stressed that Zhelev's appointments of Rumen Yankov to head the
Supreme Court of Appeals and Vladislav Stankov to head the Supreme
Administrative Court followed the proposal of the Supreme Judicial Council and
conforms with the Law on the Judiciary. But Duma called the two appointees
"bosses of phantom courts" because neither court has begun to function.
Justice Minister Mladen Chervenyakov said the appointments were politically
motivated. Yankov and Stankov were appointed to seven-year terms and under
present laws cannot be dismissed earlier. According to press reports, the
Socialist parliamentary faction will propose a law to invalidate Zhelev's
decision. -- Stefan Krause
[15] GREECE BRUSHES ASIDE BULGARIAN CONCERNS OVER POMAKS.
Replying to a Bulgarian request for clarification of Greece's position on
the Bulgarian-speaking Pomaks of Western Thrace (see ), the Greek government
said on 27 June that its Muslim minorities are free to use any language they
choose, Reuters reported. Foreign Ministry spokesman Kostas Bikas said
research and publications are free and the government "is not allowed to
intervene." He stressed Athens' interest in good relations with Sofia and said
"those who attempt to undermine [the relationship] with unsubstantiated rumors
or nonexistent issues are catering to other interests and suspect third-party
ambitions." But Demokratsiya noted that the Greek Defense Ministry financed
the publication of a textbook in the "Pomak language" for the army and that
"Pomak" grammars and dictionaries were recently published in Greece. The
Bulgarian government regards the Pomaks as ethnic Bulgarians. -- Stefan
Krause
Compiled by Steve Kettle 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 info@omri.cz.
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