RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 4, No. 87, 00-05-04

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next Article

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

RFE/RL NEWSLINE

Vol. 4, No. 87, 4 May 2000

CONTENTS

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

[01] ARMENIAN PRESIDENT HOLDS TALKS ON NEW CABINET

[02] GEORGIA DENIES IT PLANS TO HOST FOREIGN MILITARY BASE

[03] ABKHAZ, GEORGIAN OFFICIALS DISCUSS GALI KILLINGS

[04] ARRESTED KYRGYZ OPPOSITION LEADER DEMANDS RUSSIAN DEFENSE

[05] UZBEK PRESIDENT WRAPS UP VISIT TO INDIA

[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

[06] BAJUK ELECTED SLOVENIAN PRIME MINISTER

[07] BLAIR BACKS CROATIA FOR NATO PROGRAM

[08] MESIC BLASTS CROATIAN RIGHT

[09] UN FORENSICS EXPERTS EXAMINE SECOND MASS GRAVE IN CROATIA

[10] UNHCR TO LEAVE NORTHERN MITROVICA?

[11] SERBIAN PROTESTS IN KOSOVA

[12] 'NO MEDIA FREEDOM IN SERBIA'

[13] SERBIAN GOVERNMENT FINES STATION

[14] MILOSEVIC BACKERS TAKE CONTROL OF FEDERAL UPPER HOUSE

[15] ROMANIAN NUCLEAR PLANT WORKERS THREATEN TO SHUT DOWN REACTOR

[16] U.S. SEEKS RESOLUTION OF TRADE DISPUTE WITH ROMANIA

[17] CLARIFICATION:

[18] BULGARIAN GOVERNMENT SPOKESMAN CLEARED OF CORRUPTION CHARGES

[19] BULGARIA CONFIDENT ON EU TALKS

[C] END NOTE

[20] HUNGARIAN LEADER AVERTS INTERNATIONAL EMBARRASSMENT

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

[01] ARMENIAN PRESIDENT HOLDS TALKS ON NEW CABINET

Kocharian assured outgoing government ministers in Yerevan on

3 May that the composition of the next cabinet will not

differ fundamentally from the previous one, RFE/RL's Yerevan

bureau reported. But Minister for Industrial Infrastructures

Vahan Shirkhanian, a staunch supporter of sacked Premier Aram

Sargsian, said he will not join the new cabinet. Kocharian's

press secretary, Vahe Gabrielian told Interfax on 3 May that

Kocharian's dismissal of Sargsian and Defense Minister

Vagharshak Harutiunian the previous day had not been a snap

decision. Meanwhile, according to observers in Yerevan,

possible candidates to head the next government are Deputy

Foreign Minister Artashes Tumanian, Right and Accord party

chairman Artashes Geghamian, National Democratic Union

chairman and former Premier Vazgen Manukian, People's Party

leader Stepan Demirchian, Central Bank Chairman Tigran

Sarkisian, and business magnate Hrant Vardanian. LF

[02] GEORGIA DENIES IT PLANS TO HOST FOREIGN MILITARY BASE

journalists in Tbilisi on 3 May that Georgia will not make

the Vaziani military base near Tbilisi available either to

Turkey or NATO after Russian troops withdraw next year,

Russian agencies reported. He added that his ministry regards

as a priority ensuring that international monitors supervise

the withdrawal of Russian forces from the military base in

Gudauta, Abkhazia. On 4 May, Caucasus Press quoted Georgian

Defense Ministry official Paata Gaprindashvili as saying that

in talks scheduled for next month, Tbilisi will raise with

Moscow its demand for a share in the assets of the Soviet

Black Sea Fleet. LF

[03] ABKHAZ, GEORGIAN OFFICIALS DISCUSS GALI KILLINGS

Minister of State Vazha Lortkipanidze and Abkhaz Premier

Vyacheslav Tsugba on 3 May agreed to set up a working group

composed of police and security officials from both sides to

investigate acts of terrorism in Abkhazia's Gali Raion, ITAR-

TASS reported. At least 13 Abkhaz have been killed in the

district in recent weeks (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 27 April and

3 May 2000). It is unclear how that group differs from the

one Lortkipanidze and Tsugba agreed to create under the

auspices of the UN Coordinating Council in January (see

"RFE/RL Newsline," 20 January 2000). The two premiers also

agreed to exchange lists of persons suspected of involvement

in terrorist activities in Gali. The Georgian list contains

67 names, according to Caucasus Press. LF

[04] ARRESTED KYRGYZ OPPOSITION LEADER DEMANDS RUSSIAN DEFENSE

Ar-Namys party chairman Feliks Kulov, who was

arrested in March and charged with embezzlement and abuse of

his official position as security minister from 1996-1998,

has again asked Kyrgyzstan's prosecutor-general and the

minister of national security to allow two Russian lawyers

from St. Petersburg to defend him, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau

reported on 3 May. Investigator Ikramidin Aitkulov rejected a

similar appeal by Kulov last month on the grounds that his

case involves state secrets. LF

[05] UZBEK PRESIDENT WRAPS UP VISIT TO INDIA

completed a three-day state visit to India on 3 May, during

which he met with his Indian counterpart, K. R. Naranayan,

and Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee. Karimov's talks with

the latter focused on security in Central and South Asia, the

situation in Afghanistan, and fighting international

terrorism. The two signed nine agreements on upgrading

political and economic relations, an extradition treaty, and

a declaration pledging to cooperate to counter any future

destabilization in Central or South Asia as a result of

developments in Afghanistan, dpa reported. Also on 3 May, the

official Afghan Islamic Press agency issued a statement

rejecting Karimov's assertion that Afghanistan supports

international terrorism, dpa reported. It said the statement

was intended to divert the attention of the Uzbek people from

domestic hardships. LF

[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

[06] BAJUK ELECTED SLOVENIAN PRIME MINISTER

46 to 44 on 3 May to elect center-right candidate Andrej

Bajuk as prime minister (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 2 May 2000).

The law requires him to present a government by 18 May. His

program will center on preparing Slovenia for admission to

the EU at the earliest possible date as well as on

liberalizing the economy in order to attract foreign

investment. The 56 year-old economist has lived mostly

abroad. His family left Slovenia in 1945 and moved to

Argentina, where Bajuk became a university professor. He has

spent most of his working career at the Interamerican

Development Bank. PM

[07] BLAIR BACKS CROATIA FOR NATO PROGRAM

Tony Blair told his visiting Croatian counterpart, Ivica

Racan, in London on 3 May that his government backs Croatia's

request for quick admission to NATO's Partnership for Peace

program (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 2 May 2000). Blair's

spokesman said that "Racan set out Croatia's aspirations for

admission to Partnership for Peace and opening of

negotiations on a stabilization and association agreement

with the European Union. The prime minister gave his full

support," Reuters reported. Blair also told his guest that

the EU and NATO must help Croatia "move forward." Racan told

the Royal Institute of International Affairs that "Croatia

has every reason to expect the long-awaited Partnership for

Peace membership as early as the end of May." PM

[08] MESIC BLASTS CROATIAN RIGHT

Association of Croatian War Invalids of the War for the

Homeland, has threatened that his group will block various

"roads, harbors, and airports" at the start of the tourist

season, "Slobodna Dalmacija" reported on 4 May. The move is

aimed at protesting the government's polices on economic

reconstruction and on cooperation with the Hague-based war

crimes tribunal. Liovic has the backing of several other

nationalist organizations, including Ante Djapic and his

Croatian Party of [Historic] Rights, "Novi List" reported.

President Stipe Mesic said in Vukovar, however, that

"probably only those with blocked brains want to block the

roads." He argued that those "adventurists" who plan to

obstruct the roads are making impossible demands on the

government. The authorities will not tolerate a closing of

the roads, which were closed long enough during the 1991-1995

war, Mesic added. PM

[09] UN FORENSICS EXPERTS EXAMINE SECOND MASS GRAVE IN CROATIA

have discovered human bones from at least 10 people at a

suspected mass grave in Obradovic Varos near Gospic, AP

reported on 3 May (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 19 April 2000). The

bones are now being studied and identified in Zagreb.

Investigators have begun work at a second site near Brusane,

which is also in the Gospic area. The forensics experts are

investigating charges that Croatian forces killed Serbian

civilians in several localities during the 1991-1995 war.

Recent weeks have seen much discussion in the press about who

was responsible for the killings and which top officials knew

about them. PM

[10] UNHCR TO LEAVE NORTHERN MITROVICA?

said in Prishtina on 3 May that the international refugee

organization may cease its operations in Serb-held northern

Mitrovica if attacks on UN vehicles and personnel continue.

He added that UNHCR employees are "not prepared to be sitting

ducks...[if] thugs...continue to target the international

community," Reuters reported. His statement comes in response

to violence on 29 April in which 15 international personnel

were injured, one vehicle damaged, and another destroyed. PM

[11] SERBIAN PROTESTS IN KOSOVA

some 2,000 Serbs staged a peaceful demonstration to demand

the return of all Serbian refugees to their homes in Kosova.

In Prishtina, moderate Serb leaders told the UN's interim

administrative council that they demand that international

security forces find or account for all 1,000 non-Albanians

who have disappeared since the end of the 1999 Kosova

conflict. PM

[12] 'NO MEDIA FREEDOM IN SERBIA'

dailies "Blic" and "Glas javnosti," the weekly "NIN," and

Studio B Television said in a joint statement to mark World

Press Freedom Day that "there is no media freedom in Serbia,"

Vienna's "Die Presse" reported on 4 May. The editors added

that some 30 media companies have been fined more than $2

million under the draconian 1998 media law aimed at

intimidating or silencing the non-state media. PM

[13] SERBIAN GOVERNMENT FINES STATION

private media under the 1998 law, the authorities fined

Studio B Television $10,000 on 3 May for reporting "false

news." The station had reported that "four bodyguards" of

Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's son Marko recently

beat up three opposition activists in a Pozarevac cafe (see

"RFE/RL Newsline," 3 May 2000). The Pozarevac office of the

United Yugoslav Left (JUL), which is headed by the mother of

Milosevic junior, said in a statement that "hooligans"

attacked local JUL members, Reuters reported. The statement

added that "Marko does not have bodyguards" and stressed that

the opposition wants to "create chaos and civil war in the

country by a series of terrorist actions." The families of

the three injured men plan to sue Marko Milosevic's four

friends, AP reported. PM

[14] MILOSEVIC BACKERS TAKE CONTROL OF FEDERAL UPPER HOUSE

Draskovic's Serbian Renewal Movement lost its four seats in

the upper house of the Yugoslav legislature on 3 May

following the party's decision to boycott the Serbian

parliament, which elects representatives to the federal body

(see "RFE/RL Newsline," 3 May 2000). Former General Momcilo

Perisic, who heads the small Movement for Democratic Serbia,

said the opposition is to blame for the current political

state of affairs because "they have not been sufficiently

active either in the parliament or outside it," "Danas"

reported. Leaders of several anti-Milosevic parties in

Montenegro said in Podgorica that the latest developments

show the Yugoslav federation has experienced a "debacle" and

is in a continuing state of crisis, RFE/RL's South Slavic

Service reported. PM

[15] ROMANIAN NUCLEAR PLANT WORKERS THREATEN TO SHUT DOWN REACTOR

went on strike on 3 May to demand higher wages and twice as

many vacation days as are currently granted, RFE/RL's

Bucharest bureau reported. After Industry and Trade Minister

Radu Berceanu rejected those demands, the leader of the

plant's union threatened to shut down the reactor. That

action might pose a threat to safety. MS

[16] U.S. SEEKS RESOLUTION OF TRADE DISPUTE WITH ROMANIA

spokesman for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative

said on 3 May that the office is in contact with Romania's

Ministry of Industry and Trade to determine whether Romania

is imposing discriminatory custom duties on some imported

products. The spokesman said that if the talks fail, the U.S.

may ask the World Trade Organization to make a ruling, an

RFE/RL correspondent in Washington reported. In a written

statement to the U.S. Congress earlier this week, U.S. Trade

Representative Charlene Barshefsky threatened to initiate

actions against six countries, including Romania, for

imposing high duties on imports of clothing, poultry and

several alcoholic beverages, Mediafax reported on 2 May. MS

[17] CLARIFICATION:

Newsline" of 3 May, recognized the right of King Carol II's

first son, Mircea, to bear the Hohenzollerns' family name but

did not recognize Mircea as "prince." Hence, the usage of

that title by Mircea's son, Paul, is misleading, as is his

usage of the title "Paul de Romania."

[18] BULGARIAN GOVERNMENT SPOKESMAN CLEARED OF CORRUPTION CHARGES

spokesman (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 20 April 2000), has been

cleared of the suspicion of bribe-taking and intends to

resume his duties, AP reported. Police experts said a taped

conversation between Mihailov and a businessman allegedly

offering him a $10,000 bribe was clearly fabricated. MS

[19] BULGARIA CONFIDENT ON EU TALKS

Mihailova on 3 May announced that Bulgaria intends to

complete talks with the EU on six of the 31 chapters of the

aquis communautaire by the end of this year. She told

journalists that "the pace of membership talks is linked

directly with the course of reforms and we believe we are

capable of implementing those reforms," Reuters reported. EU

official Eneko Landaburu said in Sofia that the ongoing

corruption scandals in Bulgaria will not affect negotiations

on joining the union. "Until we receive proof, we consider

all this to belong to the sphere of rumors," he said.

Landaburu also announced that the EU is granting Bulgaria 250

million euros ($223 million) this year to help the country

achieve sustainable economic growth by implementing

infrastructure projects. MS

[C] END NOTE

[20] HUNGARIAN LEADER AVERTS INTERNATIONAL EMBARRASSMENT

To a certain extent, the 29 April decision by

Independent Smallholders' (FKGP) leader Jozsef Torgyan to

turn down his nomination as presidential candidate was a

patriotic gesture. In refusing the nomination, Torgyan has

spared Hungary an international embarrassment, the ruling

coalition inner tensions, and himself the unwelcome prospect

of being rejected by the Hungarian legislature.

According to the 1998 agreement that the FKGP signed

with the major coalition partner, the Federation of Young

Democrats-Hungarian Civic Party (FIDESZ), the FKGP has the

right to propose the ruling coalition's joint candidate for

president, and there was little doubt that the candidate

would be Torgyan. The agreement was ambiguous enough to avoid

specifying what would happen if FIDESZ rejected the FKGP's

nomination--for good reason. The deal was one of the

concessions made by FIDESZ during coalition bargaining, but

Premier Viktor Orban was certainly not unaware that Torgyan's

nomination to replace outgoing President Arpad Goncz would

stir controversy both at home and abroad. The parliament must

vote on a new president by 3 July. Signs had already emerged

that Torgyan's candidacy would not be backed by all the

coalition parties.

In fact, as early as January 2000 Orban had bluntly

stated that "it would be better" if Torgyan remained chairman

of the FKGP." Other FIDESZ officials were making it clear to

the FKGP leader that his path to the presidency would not be

smooth. But in the past several months the Hungarian

political scene has turned into one quite properly described

by FIDESZ chairman Laszlo Koever on 27 April as a "cold civil

war" in which the forces of the center-right and those of the

opposition center-left seem unable to engage in dialogue.

Furthermore, there were (and still are) obvious indications

of an "unwritten pact" between the center-right coalition and

the far-right Hungarian Justice and Life Party (MIEP).

Against this background, a FIDESZ decision to accept

Torgyan's nomination and his possible election as president

with the support of Csurka's MIEP would have pushed Hungary

into a situation closely resembling that in neighboring

Austria following the formation of that country's new right-

far-right coalition.

The contrast between the liberal-minded and

internationally popular Goncz and Torgyan could hardly be

greater. The FKGP chairman has often been described as a

"populist," though that term is too "elastic" to have any

real meaning. Torgyan is, in fact, a "radical" politician of

the kind that post-communist Eastern Europe has witnessed

over the past decade or so, starting with Russia's Vladimir

Zhirinovskii and including Bulgaria's Georges Ganchev,

Poland's Stanislaw Tyminski and Leszek Moczulski and

Slovenia's late Ivan Kramberger.

Like most politicians of this ilk, Torgyan does not

hesitate to indulge in demagogic rhetoric, frequently

courting and encouraging extreme nationalism. He reportedly

told Aurel Braun, a Canadian professor of political science

who interviewed him several years ago, that Roma would be

best isolated in apartheid-like enclosures, where, he said,

their leaders would be held responsible for whatever misdeeds

the inmates perpetrated. This "solution" was not really

original (Corneliu Vadim Tudor had proposed it in Romania)

and stopped just short of Csurka's more racist

pronouncements.

Torgyan is a typical post-communist leader whose

policies come closest to what Poland's Adam Michnik described

as "post-Bolshevik Bolshevism." Like all such "Bolsheviks" in

the area, Torgyan readily embraces the myth of "Judeo-

Bolshevism," and some members of his party do so even more

openly than he does. Within that mindset, communism was not

only imposed from the outside--an argument that can hardly be

challenged--but was done so mainly with the help of local

Jews. The danger that this will be repeated, according to the

FKGP leader, has not disappeared. Addressing a rally of his

supporters in March 1996, he spoke of a "liberal-Bolshevik"

danger that is allegedly "paralyzing...the powers of the

Hungarian nation." But he hastened to add that "We, however,

cannot be paralyzed. We are Hungarian. And come the spring

season, the Hungarian manually clears the vermin away. Let us

also clear the vermin."

There are many other examples of the "peasant leader"

understanding how to translate alleged peasant seasonal

practices into the rhetoric of daily politics. Perhaps

Torgyan's "explanation" to his party as to why he chose to

decline its nomination sums up his position: "I need to stand

firm on the barricades erected against Bolshevik

restoration," he said, adding that as president he would no

longer have been able to do so.

But Hungary, as everyone knows, is far from facing the

danger of "Bolshevik restoration." It is a trusted NATO

member and likely to become one of the first former communist

countries to join the EU-- that is, if another Torgyan does

not make it to the presidency.

04-05-00

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

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next Article