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Voice of America, 99-09-06Voice of America: Selected Articles Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: The Voice of America <gopher://gopher.voa.gov>CONTENTS
[01] E-U / YUGOSLAVIA SANCTIONS (L-O) BY RON PEMSTEIN (BRUSSELS)DATE=9/6/1999TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT NUMBER=2-253509 CONTENT= VOICED AT: INTRO: E-U Foreign Ministers have decided to lift sanctions against Montenegro and Kosovo, but to maintain them against the rest of Serbia. Correspondent Ron Pemstein reports from Brussels that the European Commission is hunting for ways to distinguish among the parts of Yugoslavia. TEXT: The European oil embargo against Kosovo and Montenegro will be eased when the European Commission adopts proposals to reverse the sanctions. The Commission will be seeking explicit assurances from Montenegro, the smaller republic in Yugoslavia, that none of the oil will be allowed to flow into Serbia. Officials say oil deliveries to Montenegro will be monitored and the sanctions re-imposed if these assurances are violated. At the same meeting in Finland's Lapland, the foreign ministers failed to agree on a plan to help democratically elected town governments in Serbia. The Netherlands and Greece had favored the so-called "energy for democracy" idea that would allow fuel to reach towns that are controlled by opponents of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. European Commission spokesman Nico Wegter says agreement could not be reached on ways to get fuel to individual towns without involving the Serbian government, which is under Mr. Milosevic's control. /// WEGTER ACT ////// END ACT ////// WEGTER ACT ////// END ACT ///NEB/RP/GE/RAE 06-Sep-1999 09:48 AM LOC (06-Sep-1999 1348 UTC) NNNN Source: Voice of America [02] MONTENEGRO / PEOPLES' ARMIES (L-O) BY PHILIP SMUCKER (CETINJE, YUGOSLAVIA)DATE=9/6/1999TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT NUMBER=2-253520 CONTENT= VOICED AT: INTRO: New armed units are being formed in the Yugoslav republic of Montenegro -- amid increasing calls for the republic's independence from Yugoslavia. But as Philip Smucker reports from Cetinje in Montenegro, critics of the new army charge it is a creation of the republic's president, who they say has an interest in making the threat from Serbia seem greater than it really is. TEXT: The head of one of the new armed groups, Bobo Bogdanovic, says he is the leader of a new defense force that will rise up to defend the republic against an attack from forces under the control of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. Speaking through an interpreter, Mr. Bogdanovic said his army represents the will of the Montenegrin people to defend themselves. /// BOGDANOVIC TRANSLATOR ACT ////// END ACT ///NEB/PS/JWH/RAE 06-Sep-1999 13:56 PM LOC (06-Sep-1999 1756 UTC) NNNN Source: Voice of America [03] RUSSIA / DAGESTAN (L) BY PETER HEINLEIN (MOSCOW)DATE=9/6/1999TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT NUMBER=2-253514 CONTENT= VOICED AT: INTRO: Russia's Security Council is to hold an urgent session on the rapidly spreading conflict in the northern Caucasus, as the death toll from Saturday's bomb blast in Dagestan reaches 50. Moscow Correspondent Peter Heinlein reports Russian jets are again bombing villages controlled by Muslim rebels. TEXT: President Boris Yeltsin ordered his powerful security council to meet after reports that additional Muslim insurgents are streaming into Dagestan from neighboring Chechnya. A Kremlin aide said the council's session (Tuesday) will consider ways of restoring order in the predominantly Muslim northern Caucasus region. In the meantime, Russian jets and artillery are keeping up a steady barrage of strikes against several villages held for nearly one-year by Islamic extremists in the Dagestani mountains. A senior Chechen official said the air strikes had also targeted villages inside that breakaway region. Deputy Prime Minister Kazbek Makhashev said 25-people were killed in the attacks, most of them civilians. However, a Russian official said he had no information on those attacks. In Moscow, Dagestan's representative to the central government, Gadgi Gamzaev, issued an appeal to President Yeltsin to take tougher measures to end the nearly month-long conflict. NEB/PFH/JWH/RAE 06-Sep-1999 11:24 AM LOC (06-Sep-1999 1524 UTC) NNNN Source: Voice of America [04] GERMANY / STATE ELECTIONS (L-ONLY) BY JONATHAN BRAUDE (BERLIN)DATE=9/6/1999TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT NUMBER=2-253507 CONTENT= VOICED AT: INTRO: Germany's ruling coalition of Social Democrats and Environmentalists suffered a setback at the start of a season of state elections Sunday. Not only have the polls weakened Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder at the federal level, they have put far right neo-Nazis into another state legislature and boosted the former East German Communist party. Jonathan Braude reports from Berlin. TEXT: It was an unfortunate day for Chancellor Schroeder. The winner in national elections only a year ago, his Social Democratic Party lost heavily in both the former East German state of Brandenburg and the Western state of Saarland. He said he was, "saddened and disappointed" by the results. He also said he was determined to continue the fight for his program of modernizing reforms, against the combined forces of the opposition and the left wing of his own party. In Saarland, the opposition Christian Democrats will now take power. Their victory will further weaken the Government in the Bundesrat, the upper house of Germany's Federal parliament, and make it much tougher to push through unpopular economic reforms. But for many Germans the results in economically depressed Brandenburg were more worrying still. The neo-Nazi, Deutsche Volksunion, won some 6 per cent of the vote, propelling its candidates into the state assembly for the first time and setting a precedent for other eastern German states, which go to the polls in the coming weeks. /// OPT ///NEB/JB/GE/KL 06-Sep-1999 08:40 AM EDT (06-Sep-1999 1240 UTC) NNNN Source: Voice of America [05] NORTHERN IRELAND (L) BY LAURIE KASSMAN (LONDON)DATE=9/6/1999TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT NUMBER=2-253506 CONTENT= VOICED AT: INTRO: Former U-S Senator George Mitchell has launched a review of Northern Ireland's stalled peace process in an effort to get it back on track. V-O-A Correspondent Laurie Kassman reports from London. TEXT: The critical review is underway, but without any direct talks between Unionists and Republicans. Mr. Mitchell is meeting each group separately at first to see just where they stand on the issues on the agenda. The review is supposed to focus on the dispute that has blocked the handover of home rule powers to Belfast. Protestant First Minister David Trimble refuses to let the political wing of the Irish Republican Army join an executive council before the I-R-A paramilitaries start handing over their weapons. Sinn Fein says there is no precondition to their participation in the peace government. The two sides have not been able to find a compromise. Mr. Mitchell insists the review will be strictly limited in scope, despite Unionist calls for an expanded review of the whole peace process. /// MITCHELL ACT ONE ////// END ACT ////// MITCHELL ACT TWO ////// END ACT ///NEB/LMK/JWH/KL 06-Sep-1999 08:18 AM EDT (06-Sep-1999 1218 UTC) NNNN Source: Voice of America [06] MONDAY'S EDITORIALS BY BARBARA KLEIN (WASHINGTON)DATE=9/6/1999TYPE=U-S EDITORIAL DIGEST NUMBER=6-11455 CONTENT= VOICED AT: INTRO: This is the Labor Day Holiday in the United
States and the subject of work has drawn the attention
of several U-S newspapers. Also, controversy
continues over the F-B-I's handling of the 1993 siege
of the Branch Davidians near Waco, Texas. In overseas
news, editorial writers are analyzing Sunday's
Israeli-Palestinian peace deal and the political
shake-up in Venezuela. Now, here with a closer look
and some excerpts is ____________ with today's
Editorial Digest.
Text: Most Americans celebrate Labor Day by taking a
day off work . the very part of life the holiday is
set aside to honor. The "New York Times" compares the
role of work in the "old world" and the "new".
Voice: The days when men and women bore the
distinguishing marks of their labor have
certainly not ended, nor will they ever end as
long as the material world is shaped in part by
human muscle. But now . there is a familiar,
prevailing sense that no matter what the job, it
is probably too small to contain something as
volatile and transcendent as our latter-day
identities, which are made up, we seem to
believe, of finer stuff than those of our
ancestors. Labor is both trap and liberation,
servitude and release, and it is tempting, on
Labor Day, to think of labor . in largely
historical terms, to remember photographs of
coal-darkened miners and young women huddled
over sewing machines... But there is nothing
historical about these labors. They are still
being performed today. Where the world of work
is concerned, we dwell, even in this country,
among our ancestors. Some people dream of
living in a world without work. But the better
dream . is that of a world in which . the
necessity of work is tempered by a choice of
labors.
Text: Some Congressional Republicans are calling for
Attorney General Janet Reno to resign. It was
revealed last week that the F-B-I may have lied about
its use of flammable tear-gas in its 1993
confrontation with Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas.
Miami's "The Herald" suggests Ms. Reno is not the only
U-S official who has responsibility for the tragedy.
Voice: So why is not F-B-I Director Louis J.
Freeh on the ropes just like Attorney General
Janet Reno? . It has been under Mr. Freeh's
tenure that constant questions have been raised
about Waco.. Now -- six-years later -- it
appears that the F-B-I was quietly sitting on
tapes that put a different color on events. .
Rightly angry, Ms. Reno -- officially Mr.
Freeh's boss -- ordered U-S marshals to seize
and secure the tapes. She confirmed that she is
seeking an independent investigator. . To her
credit, Ms. Reno immediately took responsibility
for what happened at Waco. Mr. Freeh should do
as much. Indeed, those Republican members of
Congress who long have clamored for Ms. Reno's
resignation ought to be as tough in confronting
Mr. Freeh, one of their few favorites in the
Clinton administration. The F-B-I's storied
independence . must not be allowed to shield the
powerful agency or Mr. Freeh from
accountability.
Text: After several days of what were described as
frustrating negotiations last week, Israeli and
Palestinian leaders have agreed on an interim peace
deal. The "Washington Post" writes that while a
hopeful glow has returned to Mideast peace
negotiations, Syria remains a serious obstacle.
Voice: The essence of the progress made . in
the past few days is the exchange of Israeli-
occupied land for the Palestinians for what is
called peace, based first on security, for the
Israelis. This involves a transaction of many
parts and phases, all of them intimately rooted
in the politics of the contenders. It is wise
to take advantage of the momentum generated by
the breakthrough on "Wye Two"... But it is even
wiser to anticipate the obstacles ahead. One of
them is Syria. Hafez Assad, the president, looks
to be stuck on the notion that the Israelis must
agree to restore all war-lost Syrian territory
without his having at the same time to lay out
how he will satisfy Israeli considerations of
security and peace in return. Mr. Assad has a
way to go to keep up the polish on his
reputation as a shrewd negotiator.
Text: Turning now to Latin America, Venezuela's
Constitutional Assembly, made up of supporters of
President Hugo Chavez, last week stripped the
country's opposition-controlled Congress of its
authority. Rhode Island's "Providence Journal"
describes the move as a slow-motion coup that could
end up threatening U-S interests.
Voice: President Chavez says he simply wants to
eliminate political corruption so that the
nation's vast oil wealth can be used to help the
poor and downtrodden. Sure. That is the sort
of thing all would-be populist dictators say to
justify concentrating power in their own and
their supporters' hands. The Assembly is taking
upon itself powers that have nothing to do with
writing a constitution. It is trying to run the
country before it has even come up with a
document. It has stripped the legislature of
its powers under the present
constitution.Contrary to the spirit of the
present constitution . the assembly is allowing
President Chavez to "integrate" the military
into his government hierarchy. The Clinton
administration is watching all this with
concern. . But . President Clinton, or his
successor in the White House, may have to
consider stronger measures. Venezuela is our
main foreign supplier of oil, and a populist
dictatorship with that kind of leverage may get
big ideas and become hard to get along with.
Text: That concludes our sampling of comment from
Monday's U-S editorials.
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