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RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 2, No. 246, 98-12-28Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty <http://www.rferl.org>RFE/RL NEWSLINEVol. 2, No. 246, 28 December 1998CONTENTS[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[C] END NOTE
[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA[01] NEW PRIME MINISTER APPOINTED IN KYRGYZSTANThe People's Assembly approved 54-year-old Jumabek Ibraimov as the country's new Prime Minister on 25 December, RFE/RL correspondents in Bishkek reported. Only the approval of the People's Assembly is required to confirm a Prime Minister. President Askar Akayev nominated Ibraimov to the post after the Kyrgyz government resigned, at Akayev's request, on 23 December. Prior to his appointment as Prime Minister, Ibraimov was the chairman of the State Property Committee. He is known to have health problems. Outgoing Prime Minister Kubanychbek Jumaliev was elected governor of the Jalalabad Region by the region's assembly the same day Ibraimov was confirmed as Prime Minister. Akayev sacked the previous Jalalabad governor, Bekbolot Talgarbekov, on 17 December. BP[02] KAZAKH PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES COMPLAIN ABOUT "OBSTACLES"Presidential candidate Gani Kasymov, who is head of Kazakhstan's Customs Committee, said no locations where he can meet with voters have been made available to him, Interfax reported on 24 December. Kasymov also said his election posters and leaflets have been torn down and documents outlining his programs have been sent to, but not published by, Kazakh media outlets. Kasymov referred to a poll conducted by the Kazakh Television Channel which showed him trailing incumbent candidate Nursultan Nazarbayev by 13 percentage points. Meanwhile, Communist Party presidential candidate Serikbolsyn Abdildin said at a 25 December news conference in Almaty that Kazakh authorities are interfering with his campaign. Abdildin claimed that in Karaganda, where Nazarbayev has wide support, the head of the regional election committee "made it understood that the other candidates (to Nazarbayev) have no chances." BP[03] OSCE WILL NOT SEND OBSERVER MISSION TO KAZAKH ELECTIONJudy Thompson, the coordinator of the OSCE mission in Kazakhstan, said on 24 December that the organization will not send observers to monitor the10 January presidential elections, Interfax and Reuters reported. Thompson repeated the OSCE view that the announcement of the elections in early October did not give candidates enough time to prepare. Thompson also said that "the refusal to register two potential candidates poses a serious problem." The OSCE will send a 15-member team to assess the election process, but stressed that should not be mistaken for an observer mission. BP[04] NEW KAZAKH POLITICAL PARTY EXPERIENCING DIFFICULTIESAlmira Khusainova, an advisor to the Republican People's Party, has been accused of breaking the law, RFE/RL correspondents in Almaty reported on 25 December. Police claim that according to the law, they should have been allowed to attend the 17 December meeting which officially created the party. Khusainova is accused of barring the police from attending. The Republican People's Party is headed by former Kazakh Prime Minister Akezhan Kazhegeldin, who was prohibited by a court decision in November from participating in the 10 January presidential elections. BP[05] TURKMENISTAN WILL RESUME GAS SUPPLIES TO UKRAINERussia's Gazprom agreed on 27 December to a deal allowing Turkmenistan to resume shipments of gas to Ukraine, Interfax and ITAR-TASS reported. That decision cleared the only remaining obstacle to delivery of Turkmen gas to Ukraine which had been cut off in early 1997. On 23 December, Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma visited Turkmenistan to negotiate terms for the resumption of gas shipments. Kuchma signed an interstate agreement with his Turkmen counterpart, Saparmurat Niyazov, under which Turkmenistan will provide Ukraine with 20 billion cubic meters of natural gas in 1999. Interfax reported that the price of 1,000 cubic meters of gas at the Turkmen-Uzbek border will be $36. The same amount of gas will cost $68-72 at the Russian-Ukraine border. Ukraine will pay Turkmenistan 40 percent of the cost of the gas in hard currency and the remaining 60 percent in goods and services. BP[06] ARMENIA, GEORGIA, BULGARIA SIGN TRANSPORT AGREEMENTThe transport ministers of Armenia, Georgia and Bulgaria signed a protocol in Yerevan on 23 December on transporting freight to Europe via a recently inaugurated ferry link from the Black Sea Georgian ports of Poti and Batumi to Varna, RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau reported. Iran has also expressed an interest in joining the tripartite agreement, and Iranian diplomats attended the signing ceremony. Armenian Transport Minister Yervand Zakharian said access to those rail and ferry connections could boost Armenia's external cargo turnover by 20-30 percent in 1999. LF[07] ARMENIA ANNOUNCES CONFERENCE ON DIASPORA RELATIONSArmenian Presidential Press Secretary Vahe Gabrielian announced on 24 December that Armenia will hold a major conference in September, 1999 on relations with the diaspora, RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau reported. President Kocharian has created a government commission to prepare for the conference, headed by Defense Minister Vazgen Sarkisian and Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian. In a press statement, the two ministers said that diaspora aid to Armenia since independence "has not been sufficient and coordinated" to deal with "pan-national issues." "On the eve of the 21st century we have been given an opportunity to consolidate our spiritual, material and intellectual abilities for the sake of attaining national goals," the statement concludes. LF[08] AZERBAIJANI FOREIGN MINISTER ENDS MOSCOW VISITSpeaking at a press conference in Moscow on 24 December following a two-day visit by his Azerbaijani colleague Tofik Zulfugarov, Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov acknowledged that serious problems persist in relations between the two countries, Russian agencies reported. Ivanov said that both sides acknowledged the need to resume talks within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group on resolving the Karabakh conflict. He also said that coonsultations will continue between the two countries on resolving their disagreement over the optimum approach to determining the legal status of the Caspian Sea. Finally, Ivanov again denied that Russia's intensive military cooperation with Armenia is directed against Azerbaijan. He said Moscow aspires to "the closest possible friendly relations" with Baku in the interests of furthering integration within the CIS and stability in the Caucasus region. LF[09] AZERBAIJAN, JAPAN SIGN NEW OIL CONTRACTThe Azerbaijan state oil company SOCAR signed a $2.3 billion contract on 25 December with five Japanese oil companies to develop three off-shore Caspian oilfields with estimated recoverable reserves of 75-90 million metric tons. The contract is the sixteenth Azerbaijan has signed with international companies. LF[10] GEORGIA DENIES LANDING TROOPS IN ABKHAZIASpeaking in Tbilisi on 26 and 27 December respectively, Georgian Minister of State Vazha Lortkipanidze and Interior Minister Kakha Targamadze denied Abkhaz Defense and Interior Ministry claims that a 12-15 man Georgian landing party had disembarked on 25 December near the village of Primorskoye in Abkhazia's southernmost Gali raion, Interfax and Caucasus Press reported. Lortkipanidze on 26 December said that Abkhaz Premier Sergei Bagapsh had also said that no Georgian force had landed in Primorskoye, but Abkhaz Interior Minister Astamur Tarba insisted on 28 December that the initial reports were true. Tarba added that a Georgian vessel opened fire on Abkhaz coastguards who tried to prevent the Georgian force from landing. LF[11] GEORGIAN DEFENSE MINISTER ON RUSSIAN BASE, ARMS PURCHASESSpeaking at a news conference in Tbilisi on 24 December, Davit Tevzadze called for the signing of a new treaty on Georgian-Russian military cooperation that would resolve what he termed the "legal vacuum" surrounding the status of the Russian military bases in Georgia, ITAR-TASS reported. The Georgian parliament has pegged ratification of a bilateral treaty on military cooperation signed in early 1994 to Russian help in restoring Tbilisi's control over the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Tevzadze also conformed media reports that Georgia is to purchase decommissioned tanks from the Czech Republic, Caucasus Press reported. Tevzadze conceded that the quality of the tanks is not optimum, but said that they are "relatively cheap." Meanwhile two senior Georgian army officers have been placed under house arrest for purchasing sub- standard weaponry, also from the Czech Republic, ITAR-TASS reported on 23 December. LF[12] GREEK DIPLOMAT SHOT DEAD IN TBILISIAnastasios Mitzitrasos, a 37-year-old security attache at the Greek Embassy in Georgia, was shot dead at the entrance to his Tbilisi apartment on 24 December. The killers escaped. Caucasus Press on 25 December quoted an anonymous Georgian official as confirming media speculation that Mitzitrasos had been engaged in illegal financial activities. LF[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE[13] FOUR DAYS OF CLASHES IN KOSOVASerbian security forces exchanged fire with the Kosova Liberation Army (UCK) in the Llap region near Podujeva between 24 and 27 December, leaving at least 12 persons dead. It marked the worst fighting since Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic and U.S. special envoy Richard Holbrooke reached an agreement on 12 October. Serbian spokesmen said that the renewed crackdown was necessary following what the spokesmen claimed were attacks by the UCK on individual Serbs. But observers noted that the Serbs' use of up to 100 tanks was a disproportionate response to the UCK's provocations. The observers added that the Serbs' extensive use of heavy armor may be in violation of UN Security Council resolutions. U.S. envoy William Walker, who heads the civilian monitoring mission, announced on 28 December that he had secured a cease-fire. Observers suggested that the agreement was only a temporary truce to allow both sides to evacuate their wounded. PM[14] FUTURE OF MONITORING IN DOUBTOSCE Chairman Bronislaw Geremek said in a statement in Vienna on 28 December that the "spiral of violence puts in danger the perspective of a peaceful solution to the conflict If the bloodshed and violence escalate, the OSCE would have to reconsider the forms of its activities [in Kosova] in the context of a broader involvement of the international community in the search for a peaceful solution to the conflict." Some 600 unarmed monitors, known as "verifiers," have arrived in Kosova under the terms of the Milosevic-Holbrooke pact. The remaining 1,400 were to have arrived by early January, but Geremek's remarks suggest that the OSCE may reconsider its plans. The London-based "Daily Telegraph" wrote on 28 December that the flow of events is forcing the monitors into the role of peace-keepers, which neither they nor anyone else wants. PM[15] RENEWED ETHNIC CLEANSING' IN KOSOVA?The UCK said in a series of statements in recent days that it still respects the overall cease-fire but that it will fight in self-defense wherever Serbian forces attack. Also over the long weekend, up to 1,000 Kosovars fled their homes in the Podujeva region in sub-freezing temperatures. The "Guardian" wrote on 28 December that this could be the beginning of a new wave of displaced persons in the province. One of the main goals of the Milosevic-Holbrooke pact was to enable refugees and displaced persons to go home before the onset of winter. EuroNews Television reported on 28 December that "instances of ethnic cleansing" have taken place, in which Serbian forces have looted and burned Kosovar homes. The London "Times" noted that Kosova remains "a powder keg." Balkan expert Tim Judah told BBC Television that the crux of the problem remains that Serbian and Kosovar goals are irreconcilable. PM[16] NATO'S CLARK SPEAKS OF 'NEW PHASE'U.S. General Wesley Clark, who is the supreme allied commander in Europe, told dpa in Hamburg on 26 December that "we are seeing the emergence of a new round of a possible significant escalation in the scope and intensity of the violence by the Serb side. The Yugoslav army has broken its promises to NATO The facts have been passed to NATO political authorities." On 24 December, a White House spokesman said that the U.S. strongly protested to Belgrade the actions of the Serbian security forces. PM[17] ALBANIA WANTS NATO INTERVENTION IN KOSOVAThe Foreign Ministry issued a statement on 24 December condemning the military operation of Serbian forces around Podujeva. The statement called for more international pressure on Belgrade and for NATO intervention in Kosova. Prime Minister Pandeli Majko told a special parliamentary session that "the latest course of events shows that NATO action is a determining factor for the political solution," dpa reported. Majko also called on the opposition Democratic Party to end its boycott and participate in a 28 December parliamentary session, which is slated to approve a resolution on Kosova. Democrat leader Sali Berisha, however, told a press conference in Tirana on 24 December that it is up to the party's National Council to decide about a possible return to parliament. He added that he does not expect his party to return soon, "Albania" reported. FS[18] LEADING KOSOVAR POLITICAL PRISONER ORDERED BACK TO JAILThe Prishtina district court has sentenced some 15 Kosovars to jail terms ranging from three to ten years, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported on 25 December. Most of those tried come from Kacanik and were charged with "hostile activity" and "terrorism." Berat Luzha, a journalist with the daily "Bujku" and chairman of the Kosova Association of Political Prisoners, was tried in absentia and sentenced to 10 years in prison, KIC news agency added. The Milosevic-Holbrooke pact includes an amnesty for all offenses connected with the fighting this year except for war crimes. PM[19] MILOSEVIC RESHUFFLES ARMY COMMANDThe Yugoslav president announced a series of new appointments to top military positions on 25 December. These include the promotion of General Nebojsa Pavkovic, who headed the Prishtina Corps, to become Commander of the Third Army, which includes Kosova, Reuters reported. The shuffle follows the sacking of General Momcilo Perisic as chief-of-staff one month ago. Milosevic has never fully trusted the army and instead built up the paramilitary police force as his Praetorian Guard. PM[20] REPUBLIKA SRPSKA PARLIAMENT BACKS DODIKMuslim, Croatian and moderate Serbian deputies voted in Banja Luka on 24 December to keep Prime Minister Milorad Dodik in office. Three days later, President Nikola Poplasen said that he nonetheless wants his fellow hard-liner Dragan Kalinic to head the cabinet, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. PM[21] DRUG BUST IN MACEDONIA TO HERALD NEW POLICY?Customs police on the Greek border on 24 December discovered the largest illegal shipment of marijuana in Macedonia to date. The cannabis, which was hidden on a truck, has a street value of $1.5 million. An RFE/RL correspondent in Skopje said that the bust reflects the seriousness of the new government of Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski in cleaning up smuggling and corruption. The correspondent added that the marijuana haul is but the "tip of the iceberg," and that observers expect the authorities to launch further drug busts in coming weeks. PM[22] BLAST DESTROYS CENTRAL ALBANIAN POWER LINEAn explosion destroyed a high-voltage power line in central Albania on 25 December. It was the fifth such blast this year (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 3 December 1998). The Interior Ministry issued a statement blaming the attack on unspecified saboteurs seeking to "destabilize the country." Government officials have linked the opposition to previous blasts, but did not name specific suspects. Police have not made any arrests. Democratic Party Secretary Fatos Beja condemned the blast on 25 December as a "terrorist act [against] the whole population." He called on police to bring the bombers to court, "Rilindja Demokratike" reported. FS[23] FITCH IBCA DOWNGRADES ROMANIA'S RATINGThe international European rating agency Fitch IBCA announced on 23 December it was downgrading Romania's rating for servicing its long- term foreign debt from BB to B and the rating for servicing its domestic debt from BBB to BB, Mediafax reported. Two American rating agencies, Moody's and Standard & Poor, twice downgraded Romania's country risk in recent months. Fitch IBCA cited as reasons Romania's current account deficit of about 7 percent of the Gross Domestic Product and the country's continued economic decline, estimated at 5 percent of the GDP in 1998. It said this renders doubtful Romania's capability to service in 1999 its nearly $ 3 billion foreign debt or to raise from lenders the $ 5 billion needed to cover both the external debt and the current deficit account. MS[24] POLLS SHOWS ROMANIANS UNDECIDED ON POLITICAL OPTIONSA public opinion poll conducted by the Center for Urban and Rural Sociology on behalf of the National Liberal Party shows that nearly half (47 percent) of Romanians are undecided about their political options, the media reported on 23 December. Among decided voters, 29.8 percent support the Democratic Convention of Romania, closely followed by the opposition Party of Social Democracy in Romania (28.5 percent). The extremist Greater Romania Party (PRM) is third (17.3), followed by the Democratic Party (10.5), the Hungarian Democratic Federation of Romania (6.1) and the Alliance for Romania ( APR, 5.2 percent). In a presidential contest, President Emil Constantinescu would garner 30 percent of the vote, former president Ion Iliescu 26.2, PRM leader Corneliu Vadim Tudor 17.3, APR leader Teodor Melescanu 15.1 and Democratic Party chairman Petre Roman 7.8 percent. MS[25] LUCINSCHI POSTPONES SUMMITPresident Petru Lucinschi on 24 December postponed a summit meeting with Transdniester leader Igor Smirnov, scheduled for 25 December, Infotag and Flux reported. Lucinschi's representative at the talks with the separatists, Ion Lesan, said the postponement was due to the fact that Lucinschi's "presence in Chisinau was necessary in order for him to participate in the search for solutions to some social and economic problems." The meeting was to discuss, among other things, the special status of the separatist region. On the same day, the Moldovan Foreign Ministry released a statement protesting against the recent declarations of Russian Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky in Tiraspol and calling them a "gross interference in Moldovan internal affairs" (see "RFE/RL Newsline, 23 December 1998). MS[26] MOLDOVAN PARLIAMENT REJECTS PRESIDENTIAL APPEAL ON ADMINISTRATIVE LAWThe parliament on 23 December reconfirmed its earlier decision to include the Taraclia district in the Cahul County, thus rejecting President Petru Lucinschi's appeal to grant the district (inhabited largely by ethnic Bulgarians) administrative independence, Infotag and Flux reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 22 December 1998). Iurie Rosca, co-chairman of the Democratic Convention of Moldova (CDM), threatened to dismiss parliament chairman Dumitru Diacov unless the law was reconfirmed. Diacov said this amounted to a "dictatorship of the CDM" over the governmental Alliance for Democracy and Reforms (APDR). In an interview with "Novoye Vremia" on 25 December, Diacov said that "some partners in the ruling coalition are beginning to sabotage the terms on which the APDR has been set up and seek to provoke a conflict between the president and the parliament," Infotag reported. MS[27] BULGARIAN PROSECUTOR GENERAL ASKS COURT TO VOID MONARCHY ABOLITIONProsecutor General Ivan Tatarchev asked the Constitutional Court to declare void the 1946 referendum that abolished the monarchy, Reuters and AP reported on 23 December. Tatarchev says that under the law, the constitution could not be changed by a referendum. The court is expected to rule at the end of January. The appeal coincided with a visit to Bulgaria by former king Simeon II, who was received by President Petar Stoyanov on 23 December. Stoyanov showed the former monarch Bulgaria's new coat of arms, in which the royal regalia have been restored. A presidential spokesman said they discussed ways to improve Bulgaria's international image and that Simeon pledged "to work for his country, as he always has done." MS[28] TURKISH COMMEMORATION MONUMENT DEFACED IN BULGARIAA monument in Momchilgrad commemorating the victims of totalitarianism and of enforced assimilation of Bulgaria's ethnic Turkish minority in the 1980s, has been desecrated, BTA reported on 27 December. Lyutvi Mestan, a deputy representing the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, told a rally in Momchilgrad that Bulgaria's respect of minorities' rights "is still below that of European standards." MS[C] END NOTE[29] END NOTE: A DIVISIVE CALL FOR UNITYby Paul GobleAn agreement between the Russian and Belarusian presidents to move toward the merger of their countries is sending shockwaves through both countries, the other post- Soviet states, and the West as well. And it is having this effect even though many people in all three places are now dismissing this accord either because they oppose such a new union state or because they doubt that these two former Soviet republics will ever form one. On 25 December, Russian President Boris Yeltsin and his Belarusian counterpart Alyaksandr Lukashenka signed a series of accords in the Kremlin that both men said pointed toward the unification of the two countries into a single state, possibly as soon as mid-1999. And while they promised that there would be "public discussion" of this idea -- the Russian press even called for a plebiscite -- the two presidents said that they had already agreed to introduce a single currency and common tax system early next year. Not surprisingly, this announcement has had an immediate impact in the two countries most directly affected. In Russia, reformers have spoken out against this move. On the one hand, they are concerned about the way in which this agreement was reached. And on the other, they view it as a threat to democracy and free market economics, with many fearful that such a reunification would transform the authoritarian Belarusian president into a major player on the Russian political scene. That latter possibility -- a Lukashenka run for the Russian presidency -- has somewhat dampened the enthusiasm of Russian communists and nationalists who otherwise welcome what they see as a restoration of the past and a challenge to NATO and the West. Consequently, at least some of them may oppose the reunification of the two countries for the same reason they have blocked it earlier: the enormous financial costs unity would impose on Russia itself. Meanwhile, in Belarus, the impact of the accord has been still more dramatic. Given the extent of Lukashenka's increasingly authoritarian control in Minsk, Belarusian officials have dutifully backed the Yeltsin- Lukashenka deal. But democratic activists opposed to it clashed with police over the weekend. And the Belarusian Popular Front issued a statement noting that the accord reflects Lukashenka's willingness "to eliminate Belarusian statehood" in order to enhance his power. This fundamental difference of opinion sets the stage for ever sharper political combat between Lukashenka and those Belarusians who are committed not only to national independence but to democracy, free markets, and cooperation with the West. As dramatic as that clash is likely to be in the coming weeks and months, the consequences of the Yeltsin-Lukashenka accord on Russian relations with the other post-Soviet states and with the West are likely to prove far more significant. The Yeltsin-Lukashenka accord appears certain to presage an expanded effort by Moscow to promote the reintegration of the former Soviet republics. And such a move will almost certainly exacerbate relations within and among them. Within many of these countries, some political factions will welcome proposals for closer relations, given their current economic difficulties. But there will be many more who will oppose any such moves lest they lead as with Belarus to the extinction of national statehood. And whatever the outcome in the short term, such domestic conflicts are likely to leave many of the governments involved weakened politically, thus setting the stage for increased Russian influence there despite Moscow's current weakness. But the greatest challenge by far that is posed by the Yeltsin-Lukashenka agreement may be to Western governments: First, it represents a direct challenge to NATO which is now scheduled to include Poland as a member later this spring. Second, it highlights the continuing influence in Moscow of those interested in reversing the 1991 dissolution of the Soviet Union and calls into question Yeltsin's past commitments to oppose any such revision. And third, by setting the stage for greater conflict among the post-Soviet states as well as between Moscow and the West, this agreement may force Western governments to play a very different role than they would like. While increased conflict in the region may lead some to advocate a further retrenchment of Western involvement in the region, increased conflict between Moscow and the West would likely have precisely the opposite effect. And for all these reasons, the Yeltsin-Lukashenka accord appears likely to define the nature of many conflicts in the post-Soviet states during the next year as well as the ways in which all the players will respond. 28-12-98 Reprinted with permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
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