OMRI Daily Digest II, No. 185, 22 September 1995

From: "Steve Iatrou" <siatrou@cdsp.neu.edu>

Open Media Research Institute Directory

CONTENTS

  • [1] CILLER ASKED TO FORM NEW TURKISH GOVERNMENT.

  • [2] IZETBEGOVIC WANTS DEMILITARIZATION OF BANJA LUKA.

  • [3] BOSNIAN SERB LEADER CALLS FOR REJECTION OF PALE REGIME.

  • [4] BATTLEFIELD UPDATE.

  • [5] WHERE IS GENERAL MLADIC?

  • [6] SERBIAN RADICALS HOLD MASS RALLY.

  • [7] ETHNIC ALBANIANS SENTENCED IN KOSOVO.

  • [8] ROMANIAN HUMANITARIAN AID FOR RUMP YUGOSLAVIA.

  • [9] BULGARIAN PREMIER SURVIVES NO-CONFIDENCE VOTE.

  • [10] BULGARIA URGED TO SHUT DOWN NUCLEAR REACTOR.

  • [11] BULGARIA REPLACES AMBASSADORS.

  • [12] ALBANIAN PARLIAMENT VOTES OUT SUPREME COURT JUSTICE.

  • [13] ALBANIAN COURT UPHOLDS SENTENCE ON HOXHA.

    •

    OMRI DAILY DIGEST

    No. 185, Part II, 22 September 1995

    SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

    [1] CILLER ASKED TO FORM NEW TURKISH GOVERNMENT.

    President Suleyman Demirel on 21 September asked Tansu Ciller to form a new government, Reuters reported. Ciller resigned the previous day after her coalition broke up but was asked by Demirel to act as caretaker premier until a new government is in place (see OMRI Daily Digest, 21 September 1995). Ciller's office announced she will hold talks with other party leaders "to focus on forming a government." Meanwhile, Mesut Yilmaz of the opposition Motherland Party virtually ruled out the possibility of forming a lasting coalition with Ciller. -- Stefan Krause, OMRI, Inc.

    [2] IZETBEGOVIC WANTS DEMILITARIZATION OF BANJA LUKA.

    Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic has demanded that the Bosnian Serbs demilitarize their embattled northwest Bosnian stronghold and set up a civilian authority. He said that the refugees could then stay on in the town and that the Bosnian army would not enter it. He called for the full lifting of the siege of Sarajevo and the restoration of utilities. The president also wants free access to Gorazde among his conditions for approving a 60-day ceasefire, the BBC said on 22 September. The VOA reported, however, that the Serbs have already rejected a truce. The Croatian and Bosnian offensive appears to have stopped, and Croatian troops have begun to pull back. Clashes have nonetheless been reported in central and southern parts of the republic. -- Patrick Moore, OMRI, Inc.

    [3] BOSNIAN SERB LEADER CALLS FOR REJECTION OF PALE REGIME.

    Nasa Borba on 22 September interviewed Mirko Pejanovic, a member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the president of the Serbian Citizens' Council. Pejanovic is a leading spokesman of the more than 100,000 "forgotten Serbs" who support a multi-ethnic state, live under Bosnian government control, and reject the nationalist leadership of Radovan Karadzic. Pejanovic urged Serbs in areas run by Pale to set up local self-government bodies and to contact UNPROFOR and the Bosnian authorities. He said the Serbs have an inalienable right to equality and autonomy and that the council will raise these issues in upcoming talks in Washington. Pejanovic also argued that there can be "no just solution" without the return of refugees to their homes. -- Patrick Moore, OMRI, Inc.

    [4] BATTLEFIELD UPDATE.

    There are conflicting reports on the actual state of affairs on the front lines, but Nasa Borba said on 22 September that Prijedor, Mrkonjic Grad, and Sanski Most remain under Bosnian Serb control. Reuters stated that disappointed Croatian troops were ordered to pull back as they were about to enter the empty town of Bosanski Novi. Vjesnik noted that the allied forces are only 25 km from Banja Luka, while Slobodna Dalmicija added that the Bosnian army is approaching Doboj. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung quoted the UNHCR as saying that 432 mainly Muslim civilians were rounded up in a stadium in Doboj, robbed, put on buses, and dumped at the front. Reuters Television said it had proof of the murder of some Serbian civilians by Croatian troops, while AFP stated that Serbian planes from Banja Luka dropped cluster bombs on Croatian positions. -- Patrick Moore, OMRI, Inc.

    [5] WHERE IS GENERAL MLADIC?

    Novi list reported that the Croats andgovernment forces now appear to control about 50% of the republic's territory, a gain of about 4,000 sq km since the offensive began. Slobodna Dalmacija on 21 September concluded that the current partition plan has been overtaken by events and that the Serbs will have to be content with 25% of the total territory. The Independent and the International Herald Tribune discussed one of the great mysteries surrounding the dramatic recent developments, namely the disappearance of General Ratko Mladic at a time when his troops were on the run. It appears that he was hospitalized in Belgrade, but that he is now elsewhere. Speculation centers on theories that Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic has punished him for his hard-line stand on keeping guns around Sarajevo or that he has voluntarily taken himself out of a no-win situation. -- Patrick Moore, OMRI, Inc.

    [6] SERBIAN RADICALS HOLD MASS RALLY.

    A rally organized by the ultranationalist Serbian Radical Party (SRS) outside the federal rump Yugoslav parliament on 21 September attracted some 20,000 people, Nasa Borba reported the next day. Keynote speaker Vojislav Seselj, an accused war criminal and SRS leader, vowed that his opposition to Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic would continue unabated. The SRS has accused the president of betraying Serbian nationalists. Seselj noted that "for us Radicals, the only place is either in prison or in power." How much support Seselj has managed to draw from refugees who have entered Serbia since Croatia reclaimed Krajina is unknown. -- Stan Markotich, OMRI, Inc.

    [7] ETHNIC ALBANIANS SENTENCED IN KOSOVO.

    Thirty-eight former ethnic Albanian police officers in Kosovo were sentenced on 21 September to prison terms of between one and six-and-a-half years on charges of conspiring to form a breakaway state of Kosovo, AFP reported. The former police officers were found guilty of "'hostile association' in militias threatening the 'territorial integrity of Serbia' by seeking to create an independent state of Kosovo." They were reportedly beaten and tortured in prison while awaiting trial in attempts to extract confessions from them. In a separate development, after Serbian media reported that ethnic Serbs being resettled in Kosovo are experiencing food and clothing shortages, Serbian police officials throughout the province reportedly began looting marketplaces. -- Stan Markotich, OMRI, Inc.

    [8] ROMANIAN HUMANITARIAN AID FOR RUMP YUGOSLAVIA.

    The National Red Cross Council on 21 September announced that Romania will grant humanitarian aid to refugees on the territory of the rump Yugoslavia, Radio Bucharest reported. The aid, consisting mainly of staples and clothing worth 800 million lei (some $400,000), was approved by Romania's government. The same source said the move has been given the green light from the Security Council committee in charge of supervising the implementation of the UN embargo against Serbia and Montenegro. A first transport is scheduled to take place next week. -- Dan Ionescu, OMRI, Inc.

    [9] BULGARIAN PREMIER SURVIVES NO-CONFIDENCE VOTE.

    A vote of no confidence in Zhan Videnov on 22 September failed to muster the required majority, Reuters reported. Of the 232 legislators present, only 102 supported the vote, initiated by the Union of Democratic Forces (SDS), while 130 voted against. The Bulgarian Socialist Party, which holds 125 seats in the 240-member parliament, was supported by the Bulgarian Business Bloc, which has 12. The People's Union and the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedom had announced they would vote against Videnov. The SDS initiated the vote because it holds Videnov responsible for the killing of 14 soldiers in a road crash (see OMRI Daily Digest, 13 and 21 September 1995). It was the first no-confidence vote in Videnov since he was elected prime minister in January 1995. -- Stefan Krause, OMRI, Inc.

    [10] BULGARIA URGED TO SHUT DOWN NUCLEAR REACTOR.

    The G-7 ambassadors to Bulgaria on 21 September handed a letter to Deputy Prime Minister Kiril Tsochev demanding that Unit 1 of the Kozloduy nuclear plant be shut down permanently because it poses a security threat to the region, Demokratsiya reported the following day. Tsochev said the memorandum is based on outdated analyses and does not take recent improvements to the reactor into account. Yanko Yanev, head of Bulgaria's Nuclear Safety Agency, said the reactor can be operated safely. Unit 1 was shut down in February for refueling, repairs, and inspections and is scheduled to be brought back on line in the next weeks. Bulgaria is reluctant to close down any of the four units at Kozloduy because the reactor provides around 40% of Bulgaria's electricity. -- Stefan Krause, OMRI, Inc.

    [11] BULGARIA REPLACES AMBASSADORS.

    The Bulgarian government on 21 September asked President Zhelyu Zhelev to issue decrees on replacing a number of ambassadors, Bulgarian newspapers reported the following day. The ambassadors to the UN, the Council of Europe, the Vatican, Belgium, Switzerland, Portugal, Poland, Albania, and Hungary will be replaced. In the case of UN ambassador Slavi Pashovski (see OMRI Daily Digest, 21 September 1995), Zhelev blamed the government for excluding the diplomat from the Bulgarian delegation. 24 chasa cited Zhelev as saying that he is the lawful ambassador and thus cannot be excluded from the delegation. Pashovski said in an interview with Trud that his exclusion changes the constitutional balance and deprives the president of his right to represent Bulgaria through ambassadors selected by him. -- Stefan Krause, OMRI, Inc.

    [12] ALBANIAN PARLIAMENT VOTES OUT SUPREME COURT JUSTICE.

    The Albanian parliament has voted to remove Supreme Court head Zef Brozi and to name Avni Shehu, Brozi's deputy, as his replacement, international media reported on 21 September. This move comes in the wake of a long-standing feud between Brozi and the government. Brozi has argued that a Supreme Court justice can be removed only if he commits a serious crime or is proven to be incompetent. He was not available for comment on the parliamentary vote. The opposition Socialist Party boycotted the ballot. -- Stan Markotich, OMRI, Inc.

    [13] ALBANIAN COURT UPHOLDS SENTENCE ON HOXHA.

    The Supreme Court on 21 February upheld a one-year prison sentence on Ilir Hoxha, eldest son of the late communist dictator Enver Hoxha, Reuters reported the same day. In June, Hoxha was found guilty of "inciting national hatred by endangering the public peace, calling for hatred against parts of the population,...[and] calling for vengeance" in an interview with Modeste in April. In other news, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on 20 September reported that the Albanian Helsinki Committee called the conditions in the remand prison of Peshkopi "disgraceful." Prisoners are held in "dank, subterranean cells with low ceilings" for up to one year, the report says. -- 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 info@omri.cz

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