Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2001 16:02:19 -0500
Reply-To: Mentor Cana <[log in to unmask]>
Sender: Albanian News & Information Network
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From: Mentor Cana <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: News:RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 5, No. 216, Part II, 14 November 2001
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RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 5, No. 216, Part II, 14 November 2001
MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT WANTS CONTINUED U.S. BACKING. U.S. Deputy
Assistant Secretary of State Janet Bogue discussed the political and
security situations in Macedonia with President Boris Trajkovski in
Skopje on 13 November, AP reported. He asked Washington to continue its
support for the peace process. She also met with Prime Minister Ljubco
Georgievski. It is not clear whether he told her what he recently told
U.S. envoy James Pardew, namely that the U.S. is "the greatest
terrorist." PM
MACEDONIAN CRISIS AREA REMAINS TENSE. No new incidents were noted
in the Tetovo area on 13 November, AP reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline,"
13 November 2001). NATO troops and international observers -- with the
assistance of three helicopters -- closely monitored the movements of
Macedonian forces in the area. The news agency noted, however, that
"dozens of civilians, mainly ethnic Albanian women and children, were
seen fleeing the area, fearing possible police action." Reuters reported
that the men of the villages erected armed roadblocks while sending
their families out of the area. One villager told Reuters that they are
not guerrillas but local people protecting their homes. Hard-line
Interior Minister Ljube Boskovski said on 12 November that he wants a
"24-hour" police presence in areas where they have recently returned
with only limited daytime patrols, AFP reported. PM
YUGOSLAV MINISTER ASKS UN FOR SUPPORT. Foreign Minister Goran
Svilanovic told the UN General Assembly on 13 November that his country
faces several important problems, including security in Kosova and
Serbia's future relations with Montenegro, AP reported. He said: "These
questions do not concern Yugoslavia alone; they are also of vital
political importance for the entire region of southeast Europe. [They
have] to be addressed by broad regional action and with the help of the
international community." Observers note that Kosova is in practice an
international protectorate, linked to Yugoslavia only on paper in UN
Security Council Resolution 1244. Kosova's 90 percent ethnic Albanian
majority wants nothing more to do with Belgrade and seeks independence.
Some Serbian critics have argued that the government would do well to
stop spending time on Kosova and Montenegro, concentrating instead on
myriad domestic problems such as crime, poverty, and corruption. PM
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH CALLS FOR PRESSURE ON SERBIA. Shortly before
Svilanovic spoke on 13 November, Human Rights Watch said in a statement
in New York that the international community should put more pressure on
Belgrade to persuade it to cooperate with the Hague-based war crimes
tribunal, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. The NGO stressed that
Serbia must arrest and extradite indicted war criminals. PM
MONTENEGRO, CROATIA DISCUSS PREVLAKA. Croatian Foreign Minister
Tonino Picula and his Montenegrin counterpart Branko Lukovac discussed
the Prevlaka peninsula question in New York on 13 November, RFE/RL's
South Slavic Service reported. Experts from both countries will soon
meet to examine the issue. Prevlaka is Croatian territory that controls
access to Kotor Bay, home of Yugoslavia's only deep-water port and naval
base. UN monitors have been stationed in the area for several years.
Montenegro would like to negotiate the issue as proof of its
sovereignty. But Croatia is reluctant to offend the Yugoslav federal
government, which has been less than enthusiastic about dealing with the
problem. PM
MONTENEGRIN PARLIAMENT DEBATES INDEPENDENCE VOTE. Pro-
independence deputies debated the terms of a planned referendum on
independence, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported on 13 November. The
Social Democrats and Liberal Alliance want the issue to be decided by a
majority vote of those casting ballots. President Milo Djukanovic's
Democratic Party of Socialists favors a decision by a majority of
registered voters. Pro-Belgrade deputies are continuing their boycott of
the legislature (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 8 November 2001). They insist on
a much larger figure than a simple majority and want the total to be
based on the number of all Montenegrin citizens, including those living
in Serbia. The OSCE, too, objects to the simple majority approach.
Montenegrin political culture is known for eloquent debates and public
posturing. It is not to be excluded that all sides will eventually reach
a last-minute compromise in time for the April 2002 referendum. PM
POLITICAL FALLOUT OVER SERBIAN ELITE POLICE PROTEST. Interior
Minister Dusan Mihajlovic offered to resign on 13 November in the face
of anti-Hague protests by the Red Berets, who were used by former
President Slobodan Milosevic as his elite paramilitary unit, RFE/RL's
South Slavic Service reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 13 November 2001).
Mihajlovic later spoke with Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic about
unspecified security issues, but it is not clear whether Djindjic
accepted his resignation. Elsewhere, police General Zoran Mijatovic, who
is Serbia's deputy chief of state security, resigned his post over what
he considered criticism of his department by Djindjic and Mihajlovic, AP
reported from Belgrade on 14 November. For his part, Foreign Minister
Svilanovic called for the dissolution of the Red Berets as a consequence
of their "mutiny." He said that "people with weapons in their hands
cannot make political decisions. These men are supposed to execute
orders from their superiors." PM
UN SACKS MORE BOSNIAN POLICE. Officials of the UN police force
(IPTF) have sacked seven local police officers, Reuters reported from
Sarajevo on 13 November (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 31 October 2001). Three
men are Bosnian Serbs who had concealed the fact that they were
interrogators at the Omarska concentration camp in 1992. The other four
are Croats who had failed to properly investigate the 1992 murders of
two Serbs. PM
HAGUE SENTENCES THREE BOSNIAN SERBS. On 13 November, the Hague-
based war crimes tribunal sentenced Dusko Sikirica to 15 years for
atrocities against Croats and Muslims at the Keraterm concentration camp
in 1992, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. Damir Dosen received
five years imprisonment, while Dragan Kolundzija got three years. PM
MASS GRAVE BEING EXCAVATED IN BOSNIA. Forensic experts have begun
excavating a mass grave in Liplje south of Zvornik near the inter-entity
border, AP reported on 13 November. The grave is believed to contain the
bodies of up to 180 Muslim males murdered by Serbian forces in the 1995
massacre of some 8,000 Muslims following the fall of Srebrenica.
Exhumations usually take place only in the warm weather of spring and
summer, but Muslims planning to return to their homes in Liplje asked
the forensics experts to start work before they move in. PM
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