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RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 2, No. 41, 98-03-02Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty <http://www.rferl.org>RFE/RL NEWSLINEVol. 2, No. 41, 2 March 1998CONTENTS[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[C] END NOTE
[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA[01] GEORGIAN HOSTAGE-TAKERS RELEASEDThe Georgian authorities have released twelve men detained for their role in the 19 February abduction of four UNOMIG observers in the western Georgian town of Zugdidi, Interfax reported on 27 February. The men have given written pledges not to leave the area. Speaking to journalists in Zugdidi, one of the twelve denied reports that Gocha Esebua, the leader of the group, had been killed, but admitted that he does not know Esebua's present whereabouts, ITAR-TASS reported on 2 March. Esebua escaped on 25 February from the village of Djikhaskari where the hostages were being held several hours before his accomplices released their remaining prisoners and surrendered to Georgian interior ministry forces. LF[02] ARMENIAN PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION ROUNDUPIn an interview with RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau on 28 February, former Armenian Communist Party First Secretary Karen Demirchyan said that if elected president in the 16 March poll he aims to consolidate all political forces in order to promote democratization and the transition to a free market economy. He claimed his long acquaintance with Azerbaijani President Heidar Aliev could help expedite a solution to the Karabakh conflict. Demirchyan denied reports that he has concluded a secret agreement with Prime Minister and acting President Robert Kocharyan to ensure the latter's election as president. On 27 February, National Democratic Union Chairman Vazgen Manukyan told journalists that "the police, former KGB and government bodies" are pressuring people to vote for Kocharyan, but added that Kocharyan may be unaware of this. Manukyan said he will soon publicize evidence of numerous violations of the electoral law. LF[03] ARMENIAN FOREIGN MINISTER ON KOCHARYAN CANDIDACYSpeaking at a press conference in Yerevan on 27 February, acting Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian evaluated the implications of Kocharyan's presidential candidacy, Interfax and RFE/RL reported. Kocharyan candidacy is controversial because he does not meet the election law requirement that candidates must have been citizens of the Republic of Armenia and have lived there for ten years. Oskanian reasoned that if Kocharyan is registered as a candidate, the international community may condemn that decision as based on the December 1989 resolution of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic's Supreme Soviet on the unification of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, which has never been annulled. But not to register Kocharyan's candidacy, Oskanian argued, is tantamount to Armenian recognition of Azerbaijani sovereignty over Nagorno-Karabakh. LF[04] AZERBAIJANI PRESIDENT WRAPS UP VISIT TO JAPANHeidar Aliev and Japanese Prime Minister Rutaro Hashimoto signed joint statements on Friendship and Partnership and trade cooperation on 26 February, Turan reported. Rutaro stated that Tokyo will support Azerbaijan's bid for membership in the World Trade Organization, according to ITAR-TASS. Azerbaijan's Economy Minister Namik Nasrullaev and Japanese Foreign Minister Keizo Obuchi exchanged notes on a grant of up to 400 million yen ($3.13 million) to develop Azerbaijan's food processing industry. The previous day, Japan's state- owned Export-Import Bank announced a 5.5 billion yen to Baku to finance the upgrading of a chemical plant. LF[05] KAZAKH OPPOSITION GROUPS UNITE EFFORTSLooking toward presidential elections in 2000, several opposition groups in Kazakhstan joined forces at a conference in Almaty creating the People's Front of Kazakhstan on 27 February, Interfax reported. The new organization is made up of representatives from the Communist Party, Socialist Party, the Workers Movement, Azamat, Lada, and Azat. Galym Abilsiitov of the Azamat movement was elected chairman of the organization and said the goal is to nominate a candidate for the presidency and "struggle against the regime of personalized power carried by President (Nursultan) Nazarbayev." Azamat Chairman Petr Svoik was named first deputy leader of the People's Front and Madel Ismailov deputy chairman. Svoik said following the conference that delegates attending the conference were detained by police, according to RFE/RL correspondents. BP[06] PROTEST IN KAZAKHSTAN AGAINST RISE IN HEATING, ELECTRICITY COSTSSome 1,000 people, mostly pensioners, held a rally on 28 February outside the offices of the Belgian firm Tractabel in Almaty protesting hikes in the company's utility rates, RFE/RL correspondents reported. Tractabel is the foreign partner in the joint venture Almaty Power Consolidated and the firm has complained several times in 1998 that the company is losing money and prices for heating and electricity need to be raised. BP[07] TAJIK OPPOSITION LEADER RETURNS HOMEKhoja Akbar Turajonzoda, the deputy leader of the United Tajik Opposition (UTO), returned to Tajikistan on 27 February after five years of exile in Iran, RFE/RL correspondents in Dushanbe reported. Government security forces erected fences around the airport but a crowd of several thousand still gathered to greet Turajonzoda outside the airport. Turajonzoda said he is prepared to work on implementing the peace process in Tajikistan but repeated an earlier statement on the need to hold a referendum to replace the words "secular government" in the Tajik constitution with "people's government." He said such a change would guarantee all political parties, including Islamic, the right to participate in the political process. BP[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE[08] AT LEAST TWENTY DEAD IN KOSOVO CLASHESSpokesmen for the Serbian Interior Ministry said in Belgrade on 1 March that some 20 people died in violence in the Srbica-Glogovac- Drenica region of Kosovo, west of Pristina, during the weekend of 28 February-1 March. The dead included four Serbian policemen and 16 ethnic Albanians. Independent Belgrade Radio B-92 and Albanian spokesmen said, however, that the death toll was closer to 30. Officials of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), which is the leading Kosovar political organization, and other Albanian spokesmen charged that Serbian special police units opened fire at random at Albanian villagers, including women and children. Police sealed off ten villages with armored vehicles and shot at the inhabitants of at least one village from a helicopter. The incidents began on 28 February, when masked Albanians ambushed a Serbian police car heading to a center for Serbian refugees, which unidentified persons had attacked the previous day. PM[09] SERBIAN POLICE BREAK UP PROTESTPolice used water cannons, tear gas, and batons to end a protest by several tens of thousands of ethnic Albanians in Pristina on 2 March. The coordinating council of Kosovar political parties had issued a call the previous day for demonstrations against political repression and police brutality. PM[10] MILOSEVIC WARNS ALBANIANSYugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic broke his long public silence on the Kosovo question on 1 March, when he sent messages to the families of the four dead policemen and to Serbian President Milan Milutinovic. Milosevic's messages were, however, really intended for the Kosovars: "terrorism aimed at the internationalization [of the Kosovo] issue will be most harmful to those who resorted to these means." He also urged the Albanians not to "spill their blood on the behalf of political profiteers and outside mentors." Kosovo, he insisted, is an internal Serbian affair. The LDK and other non-violent mainstream Albanian groups have long sought to attract foreign support and thereby "internationalize" the Kosovo question. The clandestine Kosovo Liberation Army, which uses violence against the Serbian authorities and ethnic Albanians whom it regards as collaborators, advocates an armed struggle for independence. PM[11] KOSOVARS APPEAL TO WESTSome 3,000 women demonstrated in front of the United States Information Center in Pristina on 1 March, carrying signs reading: "America is with Kosovo," "We want freedom" and "Peace, not war." Kosovar shadow-state President Ibrahim Rugova called on the U.S. and the EU to put pressure on Belgrade to end what he called its campaign of terror aimed at provoking panic among the Albanians. Rugova's government appealed to Albanians in the Drenica region to "stay calm" and to "protect themselves" if attacked, Albanian state-run television reported. Fehmi Agani, a senior leader of the LDK, said that the Serbian police had deliberately created "an atmosphere of war." PM/FS[12] ALBANIA WARNS OF BALKAN WARThe Albanian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on 1 March calling on the international community to "use its influence on Belgrade to stop the Serbian military violence in Kosovo immediately, to prevent the possible outbreak of a war and to oblige Belgrade to sit down at the negotiating table with representatives of the Kosovo Albanians." The statement also pointed out that "the actions of Belgrade violate all international norms and conventions, aggravate the situation in Kosovo and cause a threat to regional peace," state television reported. In another statement, the Ministry called on Belgrade "to stop the escalation of violence and terror against Albanians in Kosovo because the deterioration of the situation there carries big risks for peace in the Balkans and beyond." Tirana added that Belgrade had provoked a "serious war situation." Meanwhile, Prime Minister Fatos Nano issued a call to the Kosovo Albanians "not to let the extremist Serbian forces provoke" them. FS/PM[13] BOSNIAN UPDATEThe Yugoslav Foreign Ministry on 27 February denied Bosnian government charges that some survivors of the Srebrenica massacre are secretly being held in a Serbian prison (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 27 February 1998). The following day, Republika Srpska Prime Minister Milorad Dodik told representatives of Bosnian Serb refugees in Belgrade that the Republika Srpska "is currently the [international] favorite in the Dayton peace process," an RFE/RL correspondent reported from the Serbian capital. Dodik added that the Serbs' future lies in charting a middle path between extreme nationalism and total compliance with the wishes of the international community. And in Sarajevo, Croatian Ambassador Darinko Bago protested to the international community's Jacques Klein about the latter's recent remarks critical of Croatian President Franjo Tudjman and of Croatian policies toward Bosnia. PM[14] BRITISH JOURNALISTS FOUND AFTER BEATING NEAR MOSTARLiverpool-based journalists Jeffrey Pickett and Michael Grimes said in Mostar on 1 March that they had been beaten at gunpoint in Croatian-run western Herzegovina by unidentified attackers, who abducted them on 27 February. The attackers damaged the Britons' car and stole their camera and video equipment, an RFE/RL correspondent reported from Mostar. The journalists reached the village of Buna on 28 February after fleeing their attackers. The Britons are investigating reports that Herzegovinian Croats are using money raised abroad for orphans in order to promote "ethnic cleansing." PM[15] ALBANIAN PYRAMIDS TO BE SOLDThe U.S.-based auditing firm Deloitte & Touche has recommended in its final report on the Albanian pyramid investment companies that the unprofitable businesses of the five largest of them should be sold off within between nine and 27 months, "Gazeta Shqiptare" reported on 1 March. VEFA, the largest company, has assets totaling $30.6 million and debts amounting to $237.5 million. The four next largest firms have total assets of $15.7 million and debts of $113.9 million. Government-appointed administrators will try to restructure the companies' few profitable businesses and sell them off later. FS[16] DID PYRAMID BRIBE JUDGES?State prosecutors have found evidence that an unspecified number of Tirana judges and prosecutors withdrew money from VEFA after the government froze its assets in early 1997. Indictments are expected soon against the judges and other suspects, "Koha Jone" wrote on 1 March. Meanwhile on 28 February, VEFA owner Vehbi Alimucaj visited a group of about 30 investors, who are staging a hunger strike in Tirana. He promised to pay back his debts if the company is allowed to continue its operation. The hunger- strikers are protesting the planned sell-off of VEFA and demand the withdrawal of the auditing firm. FS[17] IMF MISSION LEAVES ROMANIA WITHOUT AGREEMENT ON BUDGETPoul Thomsen, the head of an IMF mission to Bucharest, ended talks with government officials on 27 February without agreeing on the structure of the 1998 budget. Thomsen said the government must opt for means to ensure budget revenues by either increasing taxes or reducing expenditures. The disbursement of the third tranche of the loan approved in 1997 is expected to be delayed until after the government announces its plans. Romanian officials tried to play down the event, saying the talks had merely "paused." Also on 28 February, it was announced that the expected rate of inflation for 1998 is 45 percent, instead of the 37 percent previously predicted. National Liberal Party (PNL) Vice Chairman Calin Popescu Tariceanu on 28 February said the cabinet headed by Victor Ciorbea has "exhausted its resources," thus practically adhering to the Democratic Party's demand that the premier be replaced. MS[18] ILIESCU ON INQUEST INTO JUNE 1990 EVENTSFormer President Ion Iliescu, touring the Jiu valley on 28 February, told miners there that a recently announced judicial inquest into the June 1990 events in which miners rampaged Bucharest reflected the "revengeful objectives of the (ruling) political Right." He said the Right organized the violent events in Romania after the collapse of the Communist regime with the aim of ousting the democratically elected leaders that succeeded the Communists. The Prosecutor General's office announced on 26 February that it was investigating reports that the 13-15 June 1990 violence in Bucharest was organized by groups linked to the government at that time, and particularly the ministries of interior and defense. Iliescu was president then and Petre Roman was premier. The investigations could lead to an indictment of officials involved in organizing the rampage for "undermining state authority." MS[19] CIVIC ALLIANCE PARTY MERGES INTO PNLThe National Councils of the PNL and the Party of Civic Alliance (PAC) on 28 February approved an agreement reached one day earlier by their respective leaders, Mircea Ionescu-Quintus and Nicolae Manolescu. Under the agreement, PAC is to merge into the PNL and Manolescu is to be chairman of the PNL National Council. Other PAC leaders will be co-opted into PNL leading bodies. A joint unification congress is to be held at the end of March. The PNL National Council rejected a proposal by its vice chairman, Viorel Catarama, for the setting up of a Liberal Federation that would have also included the Liberal Party (formed last year by the National Liberal Party-Democratic Convention and the Liberal Party '93) and the national Liberal Party-Campeanu wing, saying liberal unification must be achieved only through mergers with and within the PNL. MS[20] MOLDOVAN PRESIDENT ASKS PARLIAMENT TO AMEND ELECTORAL LAWPetru Lucinschi on 27 February appealed to the parliament to reduce the 4 percent threshold needed for representation for independent candidates. The threshold is identical to that required for parties to gain election to parliament. Last week, the parliament refused to place on its agenda a debate on reducing the threshold for independent candidacies, after an appeal by 27 such candidates. Also on 27 February, the parliament rejected a motion by 35 deputies to amend articles in the constitution to bring it in line with European legislation. The deputies called for abolishing the death penalty and for reducing the maximum time of preventive detention from the present six months to 60 days, Infotag and BASA-press reported. MS[21] MOLDOVA TO REDUCE MILITARY FORCESMoldova will cut its military forces by 1,000 men in 1998, BASA-press reported on 28 February. The decision was approved by the Supreme Council of Security on 27 February, following an initiative by President Petru Lucinschi. The military currently has 9,000 troops, but the cuts will also include personnel from among the border and security guards. MS[22] WORLD BANK RECOMMENDS TEMPORARY JOB FUND FOR BULGARIAA World Bank mission to Bulgaria has recommended the creation of an independent Social Investment Fund to create temporary jobs to help offset job losses resulting from enterprise restructuring. The group of bank experts and officials ended a visit to Sofia on 26 February, an RFE/RL correspondent in Washington reported. In other news, International Equities, a subsidiary of Canada's Stellar Global Corporation, bought a 75 percent share in the Plama oil refinery, "24 Chasa" reported on 27 February. Also on 27 February, President Petar Stoyanov, on a private visit to Hamburg, told a gathering that "overcoming the long road" of communist legacy will only be possible with the help of foreign investment. Stoyanov said Bulgaria has created the necessary political conditions for "swift reforms unparalleled in Europe." MS[C] END NOTE[23] WHY THE KOSOVO CRISIS NOW?by Patrick MooreThe Kosovo imbroglio appears to have entered a new stage following a weekend of violence that left at least 20 dead. There are at least three reasons for the change in the Kosovo political scene, the most important of which is the emergence of the Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK) as a key player over the past year. Over the weekend of 28 February-1 March, Serbian police sealed off at least 10 ethnic Albanian villages in the Srbica-Glogovac-Drenica region west of Pristina. Serbian police spokesmen said that the action was aimed at capturing "terrorists" (i.e. the UCK) who had ambushed and killed four Serbian policemen on 28 February. Kosovar spokesmen, however, charged that the Serbs were themselves carrying out indiscriminate terror with automatic weapons, armored vehicles, and helicopters against civilians, including women and children. Veton Surroi, Kosovo's most prominent journalist, said on 2 March that the special Serbian police involved in the crackdown are veterans of the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and hence are "almost paramilitaries." But how is it that matters have come to such a point? After all, for many years Kosovo was known as "the time bomb that does not explode." There were two main reasons why Kosovo remained relatively quiet for most of the time since then-Serbian (now Yugoslav) President Slobodan Milosevic destroyed the mainly ethnic Albanian province's autonomy in 1989. First, the Kosovar leadership under Ibrahim Rugova and his Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) held the unquestioned loyalty of the province's ethnic Albanians. Rugova and his party are committed to policies of non-violence and of "internationalization," or of achieving a solution by bringing foreign pressure to bear on Milosevic. Second, the Serbian authorities had no need to "crack down" on Kosovo or stage military actions as they did in Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia for the simple reason that the Serbs already held all the levers of power in Kosovo. The only "threat" to Serbian authority was Rugova's shadow state, which, in any event, busied itself with matters such as education, health care, and political feuds among its leaders. All that has changed since at least the end of 1996. At approximately that point, the shadowy UCK changed its tactics from carrying out occasional, random and hit-and-run raids to conducting more frequent, well-planned, and well-executed moves against individual Serbs, Serbian institutions, or Albanians whom the UCK regards as collaborators. The UCK has meanwhile successfully established a geographical power base in much of the area between Pristina and the Albanian frontier, and some communities there have become no-go areas for Serbs, at least at night. Armed incidents have increased in this region, moreover, in recent weeks. There are three basic reasons for the UCK's emergence as a force to be reckoned with. First, the consensus has grown, particularly among young Kosovars, that Rugova's policies have reached a dead end. A spokesman for the LDK admitted in London on 1 March that the peaceful policy "has brought no results." Second is what might be called the lesson of the Dayton agreement, which ended the Bosnian war at the end of 1995. Some Kosovars argue that the international community intervened to impose a peace in Bosnia only because the foreigners had come to regard the continuing violence there as unacceptable. According to this argument, the major powers will intervene in Kosovo only in response to an armed conflict there. Ergo, this train of thought concludes, the Kosovars must provoke a war with the Serbs if the Kosovo question is ever to attract the attention of the international community. The third development involves the changes in Albania over the past year. Before the collapse of law and order there exactly one year ago, President Sali Berisha conducted a policy that was supportive of the Kosovars, who knew that they had friends in official Tirana. Berisha openly backed Rugova's goals and peaceful policies, and Rugova was a frequent visitor to Albania. In the past year, however, a Socialist government has come to power that has not always been clear regarding its policy towards Kosovo. Many Kosovars fear that Prime Minister Fatos Nano wants to cut a deal with Belgrade at Pristina's expense. Furthermore --and perhaps most importantly - - the collapse of law and order in Albania provided a ready source of abundant and cheap weapons for Kosovar guerrilla fighters. There are, moreover, at least two additional reasons for the timing of the Serbian crackdown besides the increased violence by the UCK. First, the shadow state's presidential and parliamentary elections are slated for 22 March, and Milosevic may want to provoke confusion in order to ensure that the vote is postponed indefinitely. A successful election, by contrast, would mean a Kosovar leadership with unquestioned legitimacy to challenge Serbia in international forums. A second reason has been pinpointed by Surroi and by independent Serbian journalists alike, namely that the major powers may have led Milosevic to think that he has a green light in Kosovo. Those who support this view note that U.S. special envoy Robert Gelbard on his recent trip to the region stressed that Kosovo is Serbia's internal affair and criticized the UCK as well as the Serbian police. U.S. Secretary of State James Baker delivered a similarly ambiguous message to Belgrade in June 1991. The Yugoslav army attacked Slovenia shortly thereafter. 02-03-98 Reprinted with permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
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