SKOPJE, AUGUST 21, 1995 (MIC)
At the invitation of the Macedonian Foreign Minister Stevo Crvenkovski, the Foreign Minister of the Republic of Albania Alfred Sereci arrived on a two-day official visit to Macedonia yesterday.
Last night, the two ministers held their first meeting, while the official talks are scheduled to start today. The two sides are expected to exchange opinions on the improvement of the bilateral relations between the two countries, the latest development of the situation in the near-by battle fields, as well as other topics of mutual interest.
During minister Sereci's visit, beside the official talks with his host, he is also expected to be received by the President of the Republic Kiro Gligorov, the Speaker of Parliament Stojan Andov and Prime Minister Branko Crvenkovski. In addition, the Albanian minister will also hold meetings with representatives of the deputy groups in the Macedonian Parliament.
Today, starting at 12.00 hours, the Macedonian Parliament will hold its 35th session.
On the daily agenda will be the Draft-law on local self-management as well as the proposal for the passing of a Law on denationalization.
From the field of economy and finance, there will be the Draft-decision for the criteria for assessment of the offers upon the sale of companies to persons taking over the running of the company (management buy-out) and upon the issue of shares for the gathering of additional capital.
The draft agreement and program for cooperation in the field of culture between the Republic of Macedonia and the Republic of Serbia will also be reviewed in the session, the Macedonian Government announced.
The President of Macedonia Kiro Gligorov, on the occasion of the death of the three peacekeepers in Bosnia, sent President Clinton a telegram with the following contents:
"Please accept my deepest condolences on the occasion of the tragic death of U.S. peacekeepers Robert Frazer, special U.S. envoy of the Contact-group, Joseph Crusel, Deputy Secretary on Europe and NATO and Colonel Samuel Nelson.
The Republic of Macedonia holds in highest regard their contribution and efforts in the peacekeeping process and affirmation of the U.S. role on this plan, as well as the advancement of relations between our two countries and cooperation between the two armies.
I am convinced that this reasserts the necessity of reinforced international efforts for bringing the war in Bosnia to a definite end and the restoration of peace on the regions of former Yugoslavia. Your personal efforts in this direction have our full support," President Gligorov says in his letter.
From August 16 to 19, bilateral negotiations at expert level were held in Vienna between representatives of the Macedonian Foreign Ministry and the Austrian Federal Ministry for Economic Relations, which focused on the preparation of an Agreement for economic cooperation between the two countries, the Macedonian Foreign Ministry informs.
During its stay, the Macedonian delegation had a number of meetings with representatives of the Cabinet of the Austrian Federal Chancellor, the Foreign Ministry, the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, the Chamber of Commerce and representatives of several Austrian firms.
The employees in the Chemical-electrometallurgical combine "Jugohrom" from Jegunovce sent 50,000 DEM for the refugees from Kraina yesterday through the Red Cross in Belgrade and their firm "Beohrom-promet" from Belgrade. The help consists of various sanitary materials - products of "Medicinska plastika" from Tetovo.
In the period January-July, this year, the Macedonian police captured 39 persons trying to illegally enter of leave Macedonia, on the territory of the municipality Kriva Palanka alone. All of them are now facing violations or criminal charges.
Most of these persons are citizens of FRY, especially Kosovo, the Republic of Albania, and there are also Macedonian citizens who tried to illegally enter FRY.
Furthermore, a number of attempts to enter of exit Macedonia with false passports have been discovered.
The Association of Ethnologists of Macedonia is voicing open dissatisfaction and disagreement with the Government project for local self-management, especially in relation to the introduction of two languages in some municipalities, more concretely, Makedonski Brod. According to the law, beside the official Macedonian language, it is foreseen for the Turkish language to also be in use in this municipality.
This Association claims that there aren't 20% Turks in Makedonski Brod, but that those who expressed themselves as Turks during the last census are actually Macedonian Muslims, that is to say Islamized Macedonians who have retained the Macedonian language.
These results received from the census, the Association believes, were derived under pressure from the Democratic party of the Turks in Macedonia.
The Association of Ethnologists claims that the Bureau of Statistics and the Macedonian Government are also aware of this.
By the end of the year, Macedonian transporters will be supplied with 7,000 permits for transit through Romania, of which 2,000 have already been received. This, as Radio Skopje reports, was agreed during the stay of the delegation of the Transport Ministry and the Macedonian Commerce Chamber to Bucharest, this week.
These talks between the representatives of the Transport Ministry and Romania are aimed at speeding up the procedure for signing an agreement for the arrangement of the overall relations in the transport sphere between the two countries, as well as liberalization of the transport.
According to statements of the representatives of the Macedonian Commerce Chamber, the agreement between the two countries is expected to be signed by the end of the year.
Whether the idea to open up production halls for the models of the great German car manufacturer "Audi" in Macedonia will be realized, will be known for sure in September. That is when the board of "Audi" should make a final decision in relation to this idea.
If this idea is realized, it will fully engage a number of industrial capacities, and cars from the "Audi" program would be manufactured, mainly the "Audi A3" model.
At the same time, a large number of suppliers from the aluminium, textile, chemical and machine industry of Macedonia will be included.
If Macedonia gets a green light from the "Audi" board, then, from the start, some 7 to 10,000 cars for markets on the Balkans, Near East and Israel will be manufactured, while towards the end of 1999, that figure should rise to 50-60,000 cars. The car that will be manufactured is expected to cost around 20,000 DEM. If the plans are realized, the first " Audi A3" cars should start coming out from the production halls toward the beginning of 1997. As to the suppliers, for now, the German lists contain 30 to 40 firms in Macedonia which would be included in the production process, however, this number is expected to increase.
The public auction of state-owned business premises starts tomorrow, throughout the whole country. According to the program of the Public company for managing housing and business areas, this third quarter contains 295 shops for sale, with a total area of 20,067 m2. Around half of these shops have been transferred down from past unsuccessful auctions.
This time also, most of the shops are located in Skopje (104), in Bitola (25), etc.
So far, 190 companies with state-owned capital have been privatized in Macedonia, Dr. Miroljub Sukarov, director of the Privatization Agency says.
According to Sukarov, 790 privatizations have to be carried out by the end of the year, if the image before the World Bank is to be maintained.
On the other hand, according to Sukarov, it is a legal obligation to start up 1,500 privatization by the end of the year, which is also a condition to obtain a FESAK credit from the World Bank.