RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 4, No. 42, 00-02-29

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

RFE/RL NEWSLINE

Vol. 4, No. 42, 29 February 2000

CONTENTS

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

[01] ARMENIAN PRESIDENT ENDORSE NEW CABINET

[02] AZERBAIJAN MAKES A PITCH FOR GAS EXPORTS TO TURKEY

[03] NORTH OSSETIAN PRESIDENT VISITS GEORGIA

[04] GEORGIAN PRESIDENT DENIES CONTACTS WITH TALIBAN

[05] GEORGIAN SUPREME COURT REJECTS ELECTIONS APPEAL BY STALIN'S

[06] KYRGYZ AUTHORITIES PLEDGE TO PRECLUDE FURTHER POLL

[07] ...AS U.S. NOTES FIRST-ROUND FLAWS

[08] TAJIK RULING PARTY AHEAD IN PARLIAMENTARY POLL...

[09] ...WHILE UN, OSCE CAST DOUBT ON FAIRNESS OF BALLOT

[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

[10] EU BANS VISAS FOR ANOTHER 180 SERBS

[11] BILDT SAYS BALKAN PEACE AWAITS CHANGE IN BELGRADE

[12] KFOR COMPLETES FOOTBRIDGE IN MITROVICA

[13] NATO PLANS MANEUVERS IN KOSOVA

[14] MONTENEGRIN-ALBANIAN BORDER REMAINS CLOSED

[15] TURKEY INCREASES MILITARY AID TO ALBANIA

[16] CROATIAN-SLOVENIAN TALKS BEGIN

[17] CROATIAN EX-MINISTER TO STAY IN JAIL

[18] ROMANIAN GOVERNMENT APPROVES DRAFT BUDGET

[19] MOLDOVAN PREMIER SAYS PREMATURE TO SPEAK OF DEFAULT ON

[20] MOLDOVAN PRESIDENT ADDRESSES ISSUE OF DUAL CITIZENSHIP

[21] LIBYA POSTPONES TRIAL OF BULGARIANS

[C] END NOTE

[22] UKRAINE PRESIDENT'S PROPOSED REFERENDUM DRAWS CRITICISM

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

[01] ARMENIAN PRESIDENT ENDORSE NEW CABINET

28 February issued a decree appointing five new cabinet

ministers, RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau reported. The new

appointees include two Communists, who will be ministers for

construction and local government and for social security and

public health, while a member of the National Democratic

Union who will be minister for state property. The defense,

interior, national security, finance and foreign ministers

retained their posts in the new cabinet, which will have 17

portfolios instead of the previous 24 (not 16, as was

erroneously reported in "RFE/RL Newsline," 24 February 2000).

Contrary to earlier reports, Justice Minister Davit

Harutiunian also retained his post (see RFE/RL Caucasus

Report," Vol. 3, No. 8, 25 February 2000). Presidential

spokesman Vahe Gabrielian told journalists that Kocharian

hopes that the cabinet changes will contribute to an

improvement in Armenia's economic situation, Reuters

reported. LF

[02] AZERBAIJAN MAKES A PITCH FOR GAS EXPORTS TO TURKEY

Turkmen President Saparmurat Niyazov's rejection of

Azerbaijan's claim to 50 percent of the throughput capacity

of the proposed Trans-Caspian gas export pipeline, two senior

Azerbaijan gas sector officials have held talks in Ankara

with the Turkish state pipeline concern Botas on a possible

alternative pipeline to export gas from Azerbaijan's Caspian

Shah-Deniz field to Turkey, Caucasus Press reported on 28

February. That project would entail rehabilitating an

existing pipeline in Azerbaijan and extending it via Georgia

to Turkey. Those exports would begin in late 2002 or early

2003 with an initial volume of 5 billion cubic meters, rising

to 16 billion cubic meters per year. Turan on 29 February

quoted Azerbaijan's President Heidar Aliev as describing

Niyazov's rejection of Azerbaijan's claim as "not serious."

Aliev was speaking to reporters at Baku airport late on 28

February on his return from a visit to the U.S. LF

[03] NORTH OSSETIAN PRESIDENT VISITS GEORGIA

held talks with Georgian Minister of State Vazha

Lortkipanidze and with Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze

in Tbilisi on 28 February, Caucasus Press and ITAR-TASS

reported. Issues discussed included measures to preclude

smuggling from Russia to Georgia via the disputed former

autonomous oblast of South Ossetia, Moscow's intention to

impose a visa requirement for Georgians, which Dzasokhov

termed "a step backward," the possible expansion of the

proposed TRACECA project to include a highway from Siberia

and the Urals to the Caucasus, and South Ossetia's future

status within Georgia. LF

[04] GEORGIAN PRESIDENT DENIES CONTACTS WITH TALIBAN

a press conference in Tbilisi on 28 February, President

Shevardnadze denied that the Georgian government has any

relations with the Taliban government in Afghanistan.

Shevardnadze, who was responding to a question from Interfax,

said the reason that the Taliban had been discussed at a 25

February session of Georgia's National Security Council was

that the Taliban "have a certain influence" on the situation

in Central Asia. LF

[05] GEORGIAN SUPREME COURT REJECTS ELECTIONS APPEAL BY STALIN'S

The Supreme Court on 28 February rejected the

Democratic Union of Georgia's appeal against a ruling by the

Central Electoral Commission barring Yevgenii Djughashvili

from contesting the 9 April Georgian presidential election,

ITAR-TASS reported. That ruling was based on the fact that

Djughashvili is a citizen of Russia, not of Georgia (see

"RFE/RL Newsline," 21 and 22 February 2000). LF

[06] KYRGYZ AUTHORITIES PLEDGE TO PRECLUDE FURTHER POLL

Presidential spokesman Osmonakun Ibraimov told

journalists in Bishkek on 28 February that Kyrgyz police will

deal resolutely with any attempts by candidates to bribe

voters during the second round of voting for a new parliament

on 12 March, Russian agencies reported. He added that special

commissions have been created to investigate reports of

serious procedural violations and report their findings to

the Central Electoral Commission. Ibraimov also said that

President Askar Akaev has no plans at present to meet with

the leaders of the six parties that won representation in the

new legislature under the party list vote, according to

Interfax. LF

[07] ...AS U.S. NOTES FIRST-ROUND FLAWS

Department spokesman James Rubin on 28 February expressed

"concern" over violations during the election campaign,

including judicial proceedings against some opposition

candidates and bias in the state-controlled media, dpa

reported. He called on the Kyrgyz government to ensure that

"all candidates qualifying for the second round are allowed

to participate in an unhindered electoral process that is

free, fair and transparent." In Bishkek on 28 February, the

president of Kyrgyzstan's National Radio and TV Corporation,

Amanbek Karypkulov, rejected charges of bias, saying that the

more than 500 candidates received a total of 2,456 minutes of

free air time, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported. Karypkulov

said that opposition El (Bei-Bechara) party leader Daniyar

Usenov received the largest allocation of free air time. LF

[08] TAJIK RULING PARTY AHEAD IN PARLIAMENTARY POLL...

Boltuev said on 28 February that the preliminary vote count

suggests that the People's Democratic Party of Tajikistan,

headed by President Imomali Rakhmonov, polled some 70 percent

of the vote in the previous day's elections to the lower

chamber of the new parliament, Reuters reported. The

Communist Party came second and the Islamic Renaissance Party

third. LF

[09] ...WHILE UN, OSCE CAST DOUBT ON FAIRNESS OF BALLOT

spokesman for the UN-OSCE election observation mission said

in Dushanbe on 28 February that high estimates of voter

turnout before polling stations closed on 27 February cast

doubt on the integrity of the poll outcome, Reuters reported.

The mission noted that "in general, political plurality was

assured," but it added that "Tajikistan must improve the

process in order to meet the minimum democratic standards for

equal, fair, free, secret, transparent and accountable

elections." Spokesmen for the Communist Party and the Islamic

Renaissance Party claimed there was widespread vote rigging

and that party representatives were barred from observing the

vote at some polling stations. LF

[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

[10] EU BANS VISAS FOR ANOTHER 180 SERBS

ministers decided on 28 February in Brussels to add the names

of 180 Serbian officials to the list of 600 persons currently

banned from receiving visas for travel to EU countries (see

"RFE/RL Newsline," 10 February 2000). Many of the 180

individuals are judges, employees of the state prosecutor's

office, or officials of state security bodies. EU officials

said that such individuals have played a key role in

repression against the opposition and independent media,

RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. The ministers also

gave final approval to lifting the ban on civilian flights to

and from Serbia. Yugoslavia's JAT airlines recently resumed

flights to Switzerland. Many western European airlines plan

to resume flights in approximately one month, when the summer

season begins. PM

[11] BILDT SAYS BALKAN PEACE AWAITS CHANGE IN BELGRADE

Bildt, who is UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's special envoy

to the Balkans, told the Security Council on 28 February that

regional peace efforts are at best a "holding operation" as

long as Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic remains in

power. Bildt stressed that there can be no peace settlement

without Serbia but that the international community cannot

legally negotiate with a regime headed by indicted war

criminals, Reuters reported. "We must actively seek change,

we must meet the provocations that are there and will come

further, and we must actively try to prevent existing

tensions from boiling over into open conflict.... As long as

there is no change of regime in Belgrade, [Serbia and

Montenegro] are set on a somewhat slow but very steady

collision course," Bildt added. PM

[12] KFOR COMPLETES FOOTBRIDGE IN MITROVICA

28 February finished work on a footbridge linking a mainly

ethnic Albanian neighborhood on the southern bank of the Ibar

River with three high-rise apartment buildings on the

northern, Serbian-held bank. KFOR plans to resettle there an

unspecified number of Albanians who have fled their homes in

northern Mitrovica. Local Serbs protested the construction of

the bridge. Serbian leader Oliver Ivanovic called it a

"cosmetic undertaking" and "an indication that NATO is

helping the Albanian side and doesn't want to do anything for

the Serbs," AP reported. The existing bridge across the Ibar

has been the focal point of tensions between Serbs and

Albanians. PM

[13] NATO PLANS MANEUVERS IN KOSOVA

alliance said in Brussels on 28 February that some 2,000

troops will take part in exercises named "Dynamic Response

2000" in Kosova from 19 March to 10 April. A spokesman told

Reuters that the maneuvers have "been in the planning for

many, many months" and are not linked to recent clashes in

Mitrovica. Soldiers from Argentina, The Netherlands, Italy,

the U.S., Poland, and Romania will take part. PM

[14] MONTENEGRIN-ALBANIAN BORDER REMAINS CLOSED

on 29 February that the Yugoslav army has closed the border

crossing at Bozaj and that "not even a bird" can cross (see

"RFE/RL Newsline," 28 February 2000). There is considerable

military activity in the border region and soldiers have set

up a checkpoint some 5 kilometers from the frontier on the

road leading to Albania, the daily added. The troops have

"forbidden" even the local border traffic that was allowed to

continue since 1997, when the frontier was officially closed

during the anarchy that swept Albania. Army officials say

that the military are carrying out only "normal duties,"

"Vesti" reported. PM

[15] TURKEY INCREASES MILITARY AID TO ALBANIA

Minister Bulent Ecevit said in Tirana on 28 February that his

country will provide $39 million in aid to the Albanian

military through the end of 2004. He told a press conference

that "since we know very well the contribution of Albania to

Balkan stability, we have paid particular attention to

helping strengthen its army," AP reported. Among the projects

that Turkey finances are arming the Republican Guard,

training special forces, rebuilding the Pashaliman naval

base, and modernizing the arms factory at Polican. Turkey has

provided $41 million in military aid to Albania since 1991.

Ecevit is accompanied by about 60 businessmen and

journalists. PM

[16] CROATIAN-SLOVENIAN TALKS BEGIN

affairs committees of the Slovenian and Croatian parliaments

began talks in Ljubljana on 28 February aimed at resolving

outstanding bilateral problems "in keeping with European

norms," RFE/RL's South Slavic Service. Topics on the agenda

include delimiting the maritime frontier in the Gulf of

Piran, sharing the costs and benefits of the Krsko nuclear

facility, and ratifying a proposed agreement on local border

traffic. This is the first such meeting since the new

Croatian parliament was elected in January. PM

[17] CROATIAN EX-MINISTER TO STAY IN JAIL

ruled on 28 February that former Tourism Minister Ivan Herak

must remain in prison for at least another month while

officials prepare charges against him (see "RFE/RL Newsline,"

28 January 2000). Police arrested him on 27 January just

hours after the new government took office. Charges against

him include embezzlement and misuse of office. PM

[18] ROMANIAN GOVERNMENT APPROVES DRAFT BUDGET

February approved the draft budget for 2000, Romanian radio

reported the next day. That draft provides for a deficit

equal to 3 percent of GDP and foresees 1.3 percent economic

growth as well as inflation being halved, to 27 percent. Also

on 28 February, the Chamber of Deputies voted by 188 to 86

with three abstentions to reject the opposition Party of

Romanian National Unity's motion to debate the situation in

the education sector. Education Minister Andrei Marga said

the motion no longer has any relevance, since the draft

budget allocates 4 percent of GDP to education, as required

by law. The previous day, Marga said he is withdrawing his

resignation in view of the 4 percent allocation and to comply

with Prime Minister Mugur Isarescu's request that he do so.

MS

[19] MOLDOVAN PREMIER SAYS PREMATURE TO SPEAK OF DEFAULT ON

In an interview with the Russian daily

"Izvestiya" on 28 February, Dumitru Braghis said "it is

premature to speak about Moldova defaulting on its foreign

debt," Infotag reported. Bragis said that tax collection has

improved and that in February "we are expecting 150 million

lei (some $12 million) in revenues to the state budget." He

acknowledged, however, that Moldova will find it difficult to

meet foreign and domestic debt arrears, saying that this

month some 126 million lei in budget funds must be disbursed.

MS

[20] MOLDOVAN PRESIDENT ADDRESSES ISSUE OF DUAL CITIZENSHIP

Lucinschi told journalists on 25 February that he does not

rule out calling a referendum on the issue of dual

citizenship if the presidency and the parliament do not reach

agreement on this issue, Flux reported. Lucinschi noted that

negotiations are under way with Romania and Russia to

"identify a solution" to this problem, but he added that "the

consequences must be carefully considered." He said Moldova's

"statehood" might be endangered if a considerable proportion

of its citizens hold citizenship of another country as well.

On 23 February, Lucinschi submitted to the parliament a bill

that would allow double citizenship only if obtained by

birth, marriage, or bilateral agreements with other states.

MS

[21] LIBYA POSTPONES TRIAL OF BULGARIANS

postpone until 3 April the trial of the six Bulgarians

accused of willfully infecting children with the HIV virus,

Reuters reported on 28 February, citing Bulgarian state

radio. The defendants' Libyan lawyer requested that

postponement so that he can study the 1,600-page indictment.

President Petar Stoyanov welcomed the decision, calling it "a

move of good will that will help find out the truth." The six

Bulgarians will be tried in a special court under laws that

include elements of the Muslim Sharia law. According to dpa,

the six are also accused of prostitution, consuming alcohol

and drug trafficking, and committing adultery. MS

[C] END NOTE

[22] UKRAINE PRESIDENT'S PROPOSED REFERENDUM DRAWS CRITICISM

Ukrainians might have an unprecedented chance in April

to express both their lack of faith in a split parliament and

their confidence in the newly re-elected president.

A national referendum, called by President Leonid Kuchma

last month, is due to ask voters if they agree to express no

confidence in the parliament. If approved by the public, six

major changes to the constitution would strip parliamentary

deputies of their immunity from prosecution and create a

second chamber of the parliament. Those amendments would also

allow the president to dismiss the legislature if a majority

is not formed within one month of elections or if a budget is

not passed within three months.

Recent opinion polls indicate Ukrainians will approve

all six points if the referendum goes ahead.

Kuchma has said he hopes the proposed changes will end

the years-long stalemate between the parliament and the

presidency. But opponents say he is trying to impose rule by

Ukraine's oligarchs--a small group of extremely wealthy

individuals who are said to use their seats in the parliament

and stakes in the media to further their own ends. Opponents

also say that the referendum would violate the constitution

and would allow the quick passage of far-reaching legislation

ostensibly endorsed by the electorate.

Those arguing that the referendum is unconstitutional

say that, under the law, the president can call a direct

popular vote on constitutional changes only after the

parliament has approved the proposals. The only relevant law,

dating back to 1991, says a referendum can be called only by

parliament.

Those concerns have been echoed in a letter sent to

Kuchma by the president of the council's Parliamentary

Assembly, Russell Johnston, and in the comments of two

assembly rapporteurs who visited Ukraine two weeks ago. At

the time, rapporteur Hanne Severinsen told journalists in

Kyiv that Kuchma had not been very sympathetic to their

concerns.

"We are very concerned in the Council of Europe what

influence this referendum will have for the democracy of

Ukraine, " she said. "The president of our assembly launched

an appeal two weeks ago to your president not to continue

with the referendum if it is not in accordance with the

ruling of the Venice Commission [the council's chief legal

consultative body]. Unfortunately we have got no promise. On

the contrary, Kuchma said he would not follow this advice."

The Council of Europe's Venice Commission is due to

issue a report on the referendum at the beginning of April,

only two weeks before the vote is scheduled. At the same

time, more than 100 Ukrainian deputies have appealed to the

country's Constitutional Court to rule on the referendum's

legality. Kuchma has said that he will respect the court's

ruling.

The proposed referendum has prompted comparison with

Belarus, where President Alyaksandr Lukashenka used a direct

popular vote to disband the parliament and extend his term in

office. Belarus was then an associate member of the 41-nation

Council of Europe, which asked Minsk not to carry out the

referendum after the Venice Commission had found it

undemocratic. Lukashenka refused, and Belarus lost its

associative status.

By contrast, Moldova--a Council of Europe member--sought

to carry out a similar referendum but later heeded the

council's advice and cancelled the vote.

Severinsen said she does not want Ukraine to go down the

same path as Belarus, which under Lukashenka has one of the

poorest human-rights records in Europe: "We don't like to

compare the situations, but there are some similarities [to

Belarus] and we think therefore it's very important for

[Ukraine] that what the Venice Commission is saying about

legality is also followed, so we don't run the risk of having

a referendum that is unconstitutional."

The Council of Europe has some leverage if Kuchma

refuses to heed a Venice Commission ruling against the

referendum. Since Ukraine joined the organization in 1995,

the council has threatened to suspend Ukraine's membership

several times because Kyiv has not fulfilled many of its

obligations as a member. This time, it could carry out the

suspension threat.

One of Kuchma's arguments for holding the referendum is

that the long-standing conflict between the president and the

parliament--where leftist deputies have blocked all

government-sponsored draft laws--has to be resolved.

But the mere proposal of the referendum, which Kuchma

characterized as "an axe hanging over the head" of lawmakers,

may have already broken the deadlock in parliament. After

Kuchma called for the referendum, the parliament formed a

pro-government majority. Some lawmakers have already dubbed

that breakthrough Ukraine's "velvet revolution."

The author is an RFE/RL correspondent based in Kyiv.

29-02-00

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

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