RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 3, No. 6, 00-01-10

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From: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty <http://www.rferl.org>

RFE/RL NEWSLINE

Vol. 3, No. 6, 10 January 2000

CONTENTS

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

[01] ARMENIAN TV OFFICIAL CHARGED IN PARLIAMENT

[02] ...AMID PROTESTS THAT HIS ARREST UNWARRANTED

[03] ARMENIAN, KARABAKH PRESIDENTS MEET

[04] GEORGIAN DISPLACED PERSONS THREATEN NEW WAR IN

[05] JUDGES IN GEORGIA THREATEN TO RESIGN OVER SALARY

[06] AZERBAIJAN REJECTS RUSSIAN ACCUSATIONS

[07] KAZAKH OPPOSITION COMMENTS OF PRESIDENTIAL POLL

[08] KYRGYZ COMMUNISTS TO RUN ALONE IN

[09] OPPOSITION POLITICIAN ARRESTED IN TURKMENISTAN

[10] UZBEKISTAN'S PRESIDENT RE-ELECTED

[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

[11] SERBIAN OPPOSITION SEEKS JOINT PLATFORM

[12] MILOSEVIC FREES SERBIAN CARE WORKER

[13] HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH BLASTS NATO OVER SERBIAN

[14] UNMIK TURNS DOWN DONATION FROM KOSOVAR

[15] ALBANIA WANTS OFFICE IN PRISHTINA

[16] MORE SHOOTINGS IN LAWLESS ALBANIAN VILLAGE

[17] RIFT IN MONTENEGRIN COALITION?

[18] WAR CRIMNALS INCLUDED IN BOSNIAN SERB AWARDS

[19] CROATIAN PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN BEGINS

[20] SLOVENIA TO UPGRADE PROCEDURES AT KRSKO

[21] BULGARIA DENIES INTENTION TO DISMISS CHIEF OF

[22] BULGARIAN DEMOCRATIC PARTY LEADER DEAD

[C] END NOTE

[23] Former Soviet Defense Minister Dmitrii Yazov Speaks

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

[01] ARMENIAN TV OFFICIAL CHARGED IN PARLIAMENT

A Yerevan district court ruled on 7 January

that the detention two days earlier of National Television

deputy director Harutiun Harutiunian was justified. The

following day, it formally charged him with complicity in the 27

October Armenian parliament shootings, RFE/RL's Yerevan

bureau and ITAR-TASS reported. A senior prosecutor told

RFE/RL that the charges against Harutiunian are based on

testimony given by Nairi Hunanian, the leader of the five

gunmen who perpetrated the killings. LF

[02] ...AMID PROTESTS THAT HIS ARREST UNWARRANTED

condemned Harutiunian's arrest as "incomprehensible" and

politically motivated. Director Tigran Naghdalian, who is close

to President Robert Kocharian, said the prosecutors are

being manipulated by the president's political foes, including

supporters of former President Levon Ter-Petrossian. Vahan

Hovannisian, one of the leaders of the Armenian Revolutionary

Federation--Dashnaktsutyun, to which Harutiunian belongs,

told RFE/RL the charges are unfounded. He added that by

making such unwarranted arrests the investigators "in no way

contribute to an atmosphere of mutual trust" in Armenia. The

Armenian National Scout Association, of which Harutiunian is a

leader, issued a statement on 8 January expressing the

conviction that Harutiunian is innocent and that an impartial

inquiry will establish those responsible for the murders and

lead to Harutiunian's release. LF

[03] ARMENIAN, KARABAKH PRESIDENTS MEET

talks in Stepanakert on 7 January with Arkadii Ghukasian,

president of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic,

RFE/RL's Stepanakert correspondent reported. Kocharian's

visit to Stepanakert was said to be a private one, pegged to

the first anniversary of his brother's death in a hang-gliding

accident, but he also met with the enclave's Prime Minister

Anoushavan Danielian and with district administrators,

according to Snark. Also on 7 January, Ghukasian named the

unrecognized republic's defense minister, Seyran Ohanian, as

commander of the Karabakh Defense Army. LF

[04] GEORGIAN DISPLACED PERSONS THREATEN NEW WAR IN

The Interim Committee for the Liberation of

Abkhazia has warned that it will resort to hostilities to return

Abkhazia to Georgian control if there are no results from its

Internet appeal for help in doing so by political means,

Caucasus Press reported on 10 January citing "Meridiani." The

committee was formed on 1 January by Georgian displaced

persons from Abkhazia. One of its member is Zurab Samushia,

leader of the White Legion guerrillas, who have targeted

both CIS peacekeepers and, more recently, Abkhaz police.

Former Georgian Defense Minister Tengiz Kitovani, who set

out in January 1995 to liberate Abkhazia by force, was

intercepted by Georgian government forces and

subsequently brought to trial on charges of creating an illegal

armed force (see "OMRI Daily Digest," 9 October 1996). LF

[05] JUDGES IN GEORGIA THREATEN TO RESIGN OVER SALARY

Members of Georgia's Council of Justice told

journalists in Tbilisi on 7 January that they will resign in

protest if the Georgian authorities fail to pay judges' salaries

regularly and promptly, Caucasus Press reported. Mikhail

Saakashvili, head of the majority Union of Citizens of Georgia

parliamentary faction and one of the authors of Georgia's

judicial reform, said that failure to pay judges on time risks

sabotaging Georgia's legal reform and compelling judges to

accept bribes in order to make ends meet. LF

[06] AZERBAIJAN REJECTS RUSSIAN ACCUSATIONS

rejecting as "a flagrant provocation and falsification" claims

made the previous day by the Russian Defense Ministry that

Chechens are creating "a bridgehead" in Azerbaijan in

preparation for a protracted war, Interfax reported. The

Foreign Ministry statement also called the accusations an

attempt to aggravate Russian-Azerbaijani relations and to

draw Azerbaijan into the fighting in the North Caucasus.

Azerbaijan's National Security Ministry had issued a similar

denial on 7 January (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 7 January 2000).

Security Ministry spokesman Araz Kurbanov suggested that

the Russian claims were intended to create the rationale for

extending military operations to Azerbaijan, according to

ITAR-TASS. He pointed out that Azerbaijan is separated from

Chechnya by a 200 kilometer stretch of Daghestani territory.

LF

[07] KAZAKH OPPOSITION COMMENTS OF PRESIDENTIAL POLL

Opposition politicians questioned by RFE/RL

correspondents in Almaty and Astana on 10 January were

generally restrained in their evaluations of developments

since Nursultan Nazarbaev's reelection as president one year

earlier. Communist Party leader and defeated rival

presidential candidate Serikbolsyn Abdidin said he sees no

positive changes in the country, while Serik Abdarahmanov

characterized his own election and that of other opposition

figures to the new Kazakh parliament as progress. People on

the streets were mostly negative in their assessments of

developments since the presidential poll. LF

[08] KYRGYZ COMMUNISTS TO RUN ALONE IN

Absamat Masaliev, who is

chairman of the Party of Communists of Kyrgyzstan and a

former first secretary (in the 1980s) of the Kirghiz

Communist Party, said in Bishkek on 8 January that his party

will not align with any other to contend the 20 February

parliamentary elections, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported.

The Communists are the largest political party in Kyrgyzstan.

The Communist Party of Kyrgyzstan, which spilt from the

Party of Communists of Kyrgyzstan last year, was formally

registered only in September 1999 and thus is not eligible to

contest the poll under the proportional (party list) system.

Its chairwoman, Klara Ajybekova, told RFE/RL that she will run

in a single-mandate constituency in Bishkek. LF

[09] OPPOSITION POLITICIAN ARRESTED IN TURKMENISTAN

unregistered Agzybirlik (Unity) opposition party, was

arrested in Ashgabat on 5 January on charges of illegal

possession of drugs and weapons after a police search of

his home, RFE/RL's Turkmen Service reported two days later.

Nurmamedov had criticized the conduct of the 12 December

parliamentary elections and the decision late last month by

the Turkmen parliament to amend the country's constitution

to allow one individual to serve more than two consecutive

presidential terms (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 30 December

1999). Human Rights Watch issued a press release on 7

January condemning Nurmamedov's detention. LF

[10] UZBEKISTAN'S PRESIDENT RE-ELECTED

Karimov was re-elected for another five-year term on 9

January with 91.9 percent of the vote, Reuters reported. His

only rival, philosopher and People's Democratic Party leader

Abdulhafiz Dzhalalov, won 4.17 percent of the vote. Turnout

among the 12.7 million electorate was estimated at

approximately 95 percent. Karimov said after casting his own

vote that he considers his "main aim" to be further political,

social, and economic liberalization, according to Reuters.

Some 100 foreign and 20,000 domestic observers monitored

the poll, but the OSCE declined to dispatch a monitoring

mission on the grounds that voters were not offered "a

genuine choice" (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 7 January 2000). LF

[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

[11] SERBIAN OPPOSITION SEEKS JOINT PLATFORM

headquarters of Vuk Draskovic's Serbian Renewal Movement

(SPO) on 10 January to develop a joint strategy. SPO officials

prepared two draft papers, one calling for joint street

protests starting on 9 March and the other insisting on

elections at all levels by the end of April. Officials of the EU

and U.S. recently gave the fragmented opposition a two-

month deadline to work out a joint strategy to end the rule

of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic (see "RFE/RL

Newsline," 20 December 1999). In Belgrade on 8 January, a

spokesman for Draskovic dismissed recent charges by the

state-run "Politika ekspres" and Yugoslav Information Minister

Goran Matic questioning Draskovic's and the opposition's

patriotism, "Danas" reported. The spokesman said that the

regime seeks to discredit the opposition on the eve of the

joint meeting and to divert attention from Milosevic's own

failings. PM

[12] MILOSEVIC FREES SERBIAN CARE WORKER

pardoned Branko Jelen, an employee of CARE whom a Serbian

court sentenced in June for espionage along with two

Australian colleagues (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 2 September

1999). In September, Milosevic had pardoned the two

Australians, who then led a campaign to free Jelen. The

ethnic Serbian aid worker joined his colleagues in Canberra

on 10 January. Upon arriving in his new homeland, Jelen urged

"people around the world" to remember that thousands of

refugees in Serbia "are still in a very desperate situation,"

Reuters reported. PM

[13] HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH BLASTS NATO OVER SERBIAN

The New York-based Human Rights Watch has

charged that NATO violated international law in its 1999 air

campaign against Milosevic's forces, "Danas" reported on 10

January. In Goettingen, Germany, the previous day, members

of the Association for Peoples Under Threat heard reports

from an unspecified number of representatives of ethnic

minorities in Kosova, who charged that the ethnic Albanian

majority persecutes and discriminates against them. PM

[14] UNMIK TURNS DOWN DONATION FROM KOSOVAR

UN officials in Kosova rejected an offer by

moderate politician Bujar Bukoshi to donate just over $5

million for Albanian-language education in the province,

"Danas" reported on 10 December. The money comes from

the funds of the shadow-state government, of which Bukoshi

is prime minister. Kosova's moderate politicians, including

Bukoshi, lost political ground in the course of 1999 to the

more militant nationalists of the Kosova Liberation Army and

have sought to regain influence. PM

[15] ALBANIA WANTS OFFICE IN PRISHTINA

government has officially repeated its earlier demand to UN

officials in Kosova that it be allowed to open an "information

office" in the Kosovar capital, dpa reported from Tirana on 8

January (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 18 October 1999). Foreign

Ministry spokesman Sokol Gjoka noted that the UN is working

on a framework that will regulate the presence of foreign

missions in the province. He stressed that an Albanian

government office in Prishtina "will assist in the process of

stabilization and democratization of Kosova." PM

[16] MORE SHOOTINGS IN LAWLESS ALBANIAN VILLAGE

on 9 January, wounding three passengers. Before shooting,

the gunmen tried to stop the bus and rob it, but the driver

refused to stop, AP reported. The incident took place near

Lazarat in the Gjirokaster area. The town, which is a

stronghold of the Democratic Party, became a no-go area for

police in 1998 following several armed clashes. The

inhabitants of Lazarat, which was a leper colony in Ottoman

times, have a tradition of behaving as a law unto themselves

(see "RFE/RL Newsline," 2 February 1999). PM

[17] RIFT IN MONTENEGRIN COALITION?

heads the small Social Democratic Party, said in Podgorica on

8 January that his two coalition partners have openly allied

themselves with the Serbian Orthodox Church against the

latter's smaller rival, the Montenegrin Orthodox Church (see

"RFE/RL Newsline," 7 January 2000). Rakcevic charged that

government officials, such as Religious Affairs Minister

Slobodan Tomovic, violate the principles of a civil society

when they openly take the side of one Church. Rakcevic

demanded that Tomovic resign, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service

reported. The Social Democrat added that his party will

"review" its membership in the coalition. PM

[18] WAR CRIMNALS INCLUDED IN BOSNIAN SERB AWARDS

Republika Srpska ousted in 1999 by the international

community and Bosnian Serb moderates, awarded medals on

8 January to several leading Serbian nationalists (see "RFE/RL

Newsline," 13 September 1999). Poplasen, who refuses to

recognize his ouster, made the awards to mark the Day of

the Republic and a religious holiday, both of which fall on 9

January, Tanjug reported. The Order of the Republika Srpska

went to Croatian Serb leader Milan Martic, Serbian Deputy

Prime Minister Vojislav Seselj, and Bosnian Serb wartime

commander General Ratko Mladic. Poplasen granted the Order

of Karadjordje to Bosnian Serb Generals Radislav Krstic and

Stanislav Galic. PM

[19] CROATIAN PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN BEGINS

campaign for the 24 January presidential vote officially got

under way on 8 January. The Croatian Democratic

Community's (HDZ) Mate Granic said in Dubrovnik that he will

work to integrate Croatia into the EU and NATO, and to

promote good relations with neighboring countries, especially

with Bosnia. In Slavonski Brod, Stipe Mesic, who represents a

coalition of four small opposition parties, said his coalition

does not want a witch-hunt. He stressed, however, that

those responsible for Croatia's problems during the HDZ's

rule from 1990 to 2000 must be called to account. Drazen

Budisa, who is the candidate of the leading opposition

coalition that won the recent parliamentary election, will

launch his campaign on 11 January. A poll published in

"Jutarnji list" on 8 January gives Budisa 37 percent and Granic

31 percent of the vote. Some 78 percent of the respondents

said they plan to cast their ballot. PM

[20] SLOVENIA TO UPGRADE PROCEDURES AT KRSKO

Gregoric, who heads Slovenia's nuclear safety department,

told AP on 7 January that his government will improve

inspection procedures at the country's only nuclear plant in

line with recent recommendations by the UN's International

Atomic Energy Agency. He did not elaborate. The plant at

Krsko was the former Yugoslavia's only nuclear power facility.

Croatia helped construct the plant and has a share in the use

of its output. PM

[21] BULGARIA DENIES INTENTION TO DISMISS CHIEF OF

Responding to media reports, President Petar

Stoyanov said on 7 January that he has no intention of

dismissing Chief of Staff General Mikho Mikhov, adding that

the government has not asked him to do so, BTA

reported. Defense Minister Boyko Noev told journalists the

same day that he intends to propose that Mikhov's term in

office be extended by two years when it expires in June.

For his part, Mikhov told journalists that he refuses to

speculate about who "masterminded" the rumor of his

dismissal. He said he has no plans to resign and that he

first heard about the intention to extend his term at

Noev's press conference. Mikhov said he will decide what

to do in June. MS

[22] BULGARIAN DEMOCRATIC PARTY LEADER DEAD

Savov, leader of the Democratic Party and co-chairman of

the People's Union, died on 8 January at the age of 76,

BTA reported. Savov, who was parliamentary chairman from

November 1991 to September 1992, was one of the main

architects of the revival of the Democratic Party. The

Democrats first belonged to the Union of Democratic

Forces and later, as part of the People's Union, to the

ruling United Democratic Forces. MS

[C] END NOTE

[23] Former Soviet Defense Minister Dmitrii Yazov Speaks

At the age of 76, the Soviet Union's last defense minister,

Dmitrii Yazov, walks with greater agility than some of his 40-

year-old colleagues. He remembers the events that took

place in Czechoslovakia very well. Back then, he ran one of

the strongest armies in the world.

Today, Marshall Yazov works as an adviser to the central

administration for international cooperation at the Russian

Defense Ministry. This interview by Petra Prochazkova first

appeared in the Czech daily "Lidove noviny" on 25 November

1999.

Q: A few days ago, all Europe celebrated the 10th

anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the

Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia. Do you consider

those anniversaries to be worth celebrating as well?

It's no tragedy, your country has a right to decide its own

fate. But I'm not celebrating. Instead, I remembered why the

Berlin Wall was established--because the Germans started a

war. The fascists are to blame for all of it, and the Germans

had to bear the responsibility for it. The Soviet Army alone

lost 10.5 million people during the war. The Germans had to

be divided. And why did the Americans, who protested the

loudest against the Berlin Wall, build a 240 kilometer wall

between South and North Korea? We left Germany in the end,

but the Americans did not.

Q: Because no one is pushing them to...

And who was pushing the Russians? We were the winners! It

was right for us to leave. But the Americans should also

leave Europe....

Q: Were you sorry that you were organizing the

withdrawal of Soviet troops from all of Central and

Eastern Europe?

Not at all. The problem is that one group leaves, and another

group takes its place. I knew it would turn out like that. The

Americans didn't cross your borders in military boots, but

they got you with money. It's enough to look at who Czech

industry works for today and the size of the unemployment

rate in your country. You're not better off than you were.

The Americans don't intend to share and they're holding all of

Europe in the palm of their hand. The Germans are paying

them and serving them in exchange for having them on their

territory. The Czechs never paid the Russian army for its

stay. In 1979 and 1980, I was the chief of financial

administration for our troops in Czechoslovakia. We had to

pay you for every unfortunate incident, every felled tree or

damaged highway.

Q: You didn't regret the departure of the Soviet Army

from Europe, but the average soldiers didn't look

forward to going home...

Where do you think it's better to live, in Siberia or in

Czechoslovakia? Of course it was better for a soldier to live

in your country. Furthermore, the Czechs had a normal

relationship with Russian soldiers....

Q: Were you astonished that we joined NATO?

I never thought that the Czechs, Poles, and Hungarians would

join NATO. [Former Soviet leader Mikhail] Gorbachev made a

big mistake when he failed to sign a written agreement with

the Americans that NATO cannot move eastward. Only a

verbal agreement existed. Gorbachev knew that it didn't

guarantee anything. Today, a swindler has turned into a

hero....

I experienced the year 1989 as an internal insult or

sorrow. In the year 1945, we lost 140,000 soldiers in your

country, and 44 years later someone comes to power and

turns you into an enemy of the Soviet people. We never sold

you. In 1939, we were ready to send 100 divisions to help

you. I would recommend to all those Czechs who hate Russia

to examine how many bones of Russian soldiers are buried in

your country just so that it could be independent, free, and

have its honor preserved.

Q: So, after all, you consider it to be unjust that you

had to leave Czechoslovakia?

There was nothing else that could be done in 1989. I didn't

think that our troops would be in your country forever. We

had to return home some day. The time had come. I'm just

surprised that the Americans can have military bases in

Germany, Italy, Greece.... For the time being, they have only a

fifth column in Russia. Just look how many American films are

on television...!

So you didn't liquidate several memorials to the Soviet

liberators who in 1945 guarded your pioneers with pride?

You didn't rename streets and squares, all in the name of

democracy? As if Praguers launched their own uprising and

freed the city with their own efforts. Why didn't you rise up in

1942, or in 1944? You rose up after Berlin fell! Unfortunately,

I know that you'll lose the Sudetenland once again. You'll see.

Q: Relations between our countries didn't worsen

after the war, but after 1968.

Relations worsened when the Warsaw Pact fell apart. When

the anticommunist Havel, the so-called democrat, came to

power. Those types came to power in our country as well.

You think that democrats are governing in Russia? Everything

is run by an oligarchy. They have billions and the majority of

Russian teachers are not even getting their wages. What kind

of democracy is it when the country's God-given wealth,

which belongs to the nation, is being sold off by oligarchs?

Why is the state selling off gas, crude oil, and electricity from

the power plants, which were built by the hands of the Soviet

people? Why is some [Gazprom head Rem] Vyakhirev doing

business with my gas? Where is your democracy?

Translated by Victor Gomez.

Part 2 will appear in "RFE/RL Newsline" tomorrow.

10-01-00

Reprinted with permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
URL: http://www.rferl.org

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