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RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 3, No. 235, 99-12-06

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. 3, No. 235, 6 December 1999


CONTENTS

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

  • [01] ARMENIAN PARLIAMENT ENDORSES NEW GOVERNMENT'S
  • [02] ARMENIAN KARABAKH VETERANS CRITICIZE PRESIDENT
  • [03] AZERBAIJANI PRESIDENT, OPPOSITION COMMENT ON U.S.
  • [04] BULGARIAN PRESIDENT CONCLUDES AZERBAIJAN VISIT
  • [05] CONFUSION OVER ALLEGED CHECHEN THREAT TO
  • [06] KAZAKHSTAN'S PRESIDENT MEETS WITH FOREIGN
  • [07] KAZAKHSTAN TO RECEIVE NEW EBRD LOANS
  • [08] KAZAKHSTAN NOT TO DEPORT SEPARATISTS TO RUSSIA
  • [09] KYRGYZ GOVERNMENT SUBMITS AMENDED DRAFT
  • [10] ANOTHER PROTEST DEMONSTRATION IN KYRGYZ
  • [11] TAJIK OPPOSITION PARTY RE-REGISTERED
  • [12] UZBEKISTAN HOLDS PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS

  • [B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

  • [13] TRAJKOVSKI WINS MACEDONIAN PRESIDENTIAL VOTE...
  • [14] ...BUT WILL SOCIAL DEMOCRATS ACCEPT?
  • [15] OSCE REPORT: SERBIAN VIOLENCE IN KOSOVA WAS
  • [16] SERBIAN POLICE ARREST KOSOVAR DEFENSE LAWYER
  • [17] KOSOVAR 'GOVERNMENT' TO ISSUE PASSPORTS
  • [18] EU OIL TRUCKS REMAIN STUCK ON SERBIAN BORDER
  • [19] DRASKOVIC PARTY TO SHUN SERBIAN SHADOW CABINET
  • [20] ALBANIAN DEMOCRATS TRADE CHARGES OF
  • [21] CROATIAN GOVERNING PARTY WANTS VALENTIC AS
  • [22] ...BUT WHAT ABOUT GRANIC?
  • [23] ROMANIAN RAILWAY WORKERS GO ON STRIKE
  • [24] ROMANIA HOOKED UP TO SOYUZ PIPELINE
  • [25] OSCE MISSION HEAD REACTS TO TRANSDNIESTER
  • [26] BULGARIA ASKS TO BE REMOVED FROM EU VISA

  • [C] END NOTE

  • [27] A DECADE OF DISAPPOINTMENTS

  • [A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

    [01] ARMENIAN PARLIAMENT ENDORSES NEW GOVERNMENT'S

    PROGRAM

    The parliament on 3 December failed to challenge

    the program submitted the previous day by Prime Minister

    Aram Sargsian's new cabinet, RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau

    reported. Sargsian, for his part, expressed thanks for

    deputies' unanimous support, which he said "gives me more

    strength." His program draws heavily on the policies outlined

    by his murdered brother and predecessor, Vazgen Sargsian.

    It focuses on a continuation of market reforms, a crackdown

    on corruption and the shadow economy, and the restoration

    of political and economic stability. LF

    [02] ARMENIAN KARABAKH VETERANS CRITICIZE PRESIDENT

    At the fourth congress of the Yerkrapah Union of Veterans

    of the Karabakh war, which took place in Yerevan on 2-3

    December, the organization's deputy chairman, Albert

    Bazeyan, accused President Robert Kocharian of

    exacerbating political disputes and of failing to guarantee

    political stability in Armenia, RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau

    reported. Bazeyan also strongly condemned what he termed

    official media "propaganda" directed against the army in the

    wake of the 27 October parliamentary shootings in which

    Premier Vazgen Sargsian, Yerkrapah's first leader, was killed.

    Addressing the 800 delegates to the congress on 3

    December, Minister for Industrial Infrastructure Vahan

    Shirkhanian, a former deputy defense minister, called for

    Kocharian's resignation and new presidential elections. But

    that demand did not figure in the final resolution adopted by

    the congress. LF

    [03] AZERBAIJANI PRESIDENT, OPPOSITION COMMENT ON U.S.

    CONCERN

    President Heidar Aliev told journalists in Baku on 2

    December that he believes the concern over human rights

    violations in Azerbaijan expressed in a 10 November letter

    from a group of 14 U.S. Congressmen is misplaced, Turan

    reported. Aliev likewise rejected the congressmen's fears

    that the 12 December municipal elections will not be

    democratic, adding that Azerbaijan will not bow to

    instructions from other countries. Opposition Musavat Party

    chairman Isa Gambar told Turan the following day that Aliev

    was wrong to argue that the elections are Azerbaijan's

    internal affair. Azerbaijan National Independence Party

    chairman Etibar Mamedov predicted that falsification of the

    poll is inevitable. LF

    [04] BULGARIAN PRESIDENT CONCLUDES AZERBAIJAN VISIT

    Visiting Baku on 2-3 December, Petar Stoyanov held talks

    with his Azerbaijani counterpart Aliev and parliamentary

    chairman Murtuz Alesqerov on expanding bilateral

    cooperation, especially in the sphere of transportation within

    the framework of the EU TRACECA program, Turan reported.

    Stoyanov also affirmed Bulgaria's willingness to participate in

    the transportation of Azerbaijan's Caspian oil shipped from

    the Georgian terminal at Supsa to the Bulgarian port of

    Burgas, noting that the signing last month of framework

    agreements on the construction of the Baku-Ceyhan oil

    pipeline do not render redundant plans for a Burgas-

    Aleksandropoulis pipeline. Stoyanov said Bulgaria will support

    Azerbaijan's efforts to be admitted as a full member of the

    Council of Europe. LF

    [05] CONFUSION OVER ALLEGED CHECHEN THREAT TO

    MOSCOW'S EMBASSY IN GEORGIA

    Quoting an unidentified

    source in the Russian Foreign Ministry, ITAR-TASS reported on

    3 December that Moscow is considering evacuating

    dependents of the staff of its Tbilisi embassy because of an

    anticipated Chechen terrorist threat. The Georgian Foreign

    Ministry issued a statement the same day saying that it has

    increased security measures at the embassy's request but

    that the measures requested by the embassy far exceed

    those required to deflect a potential attack and are aimed at

    creating the impression that the Georgian authorities cannot

    ensure security in the country. But an embassy spokesman

    denied any knowledge of any heightened danger or that

    instructions were received to evacuate non-essential

    personnel. LF

    [06] KAZAKHSTAN'S PRESIDENT MEETS WITH FOREIGN

    INVESTORS

    Speaking at a session in Almaty on 3 December

    of the Foreign Investors' Council, Nursultan Nazarbaev

    predicted that GDP should increase by 1 percent in 1999,

    compared with a fall of 2.5 percent the previous year,

    Reuters reported. He further noted that gold and foreign

    currency reserves are rising and that the national currency is

    stable, but also conceded that economic recovery could be

    jeopardized by the negative trade balance or by acute social

    problems. LF

    [07] KAZAKHSTAN TO RECEIVE NEW EBRD LOANS

    Nazarbaev

    also met on 3 December in Almaty with EBRD head Horst

    Koehler to discuss cooperation, Interfax reported.

    Agreements were signed whereby the EBRD will advance

    loans totaling $160 million to Kazakhstan's railways and

    energy sectors and Kazakhtelecom. LF

    [08] KAZAKHSTAN NOT TO DEPORT SEPARATISTS TO RUSSIA

    The Russian citizens arrested last month in Ust-Kamenogorsk

    for allegedly plotting to seize administrative buildings in

    eastern Kazakhstan and declare a Russian Altai Republic will

    not be deported to Russia, Interfax-Kazakhstan reported on

    3 December quoting a local Kazakh security official (see

    "RFE/RL Newsline," 23 and 24 November 1999). Nor does

    Kazakhstan plan additional security on its border with Russia,

    another Kazakh security official told the agency. LF

    [09] KYRGYZ GOVERNMENT SUBMITS AMENDED DRAFT

    BUDGET

    The Kyrgyz parliamentary press service announced

    on 3 December that the government has amended the draft

    budget for 2000, which deputies had rejected on 15

    November, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported (see "RFE/RL

    Newsline," 16 November 1999). Projected revenues and

    expenditures are cut by some 10 percent and now stand at

    9.769 billion soms ($217 million) and 9.58 billion soms

    respectively. Deputy Dosbol Nur Uulu told RFE/RL that the

    new draft does not address deputies' demands for an

    increase in pensions and the minimum monthly wage. Also on

    3 December, First Deputy Prime Minister Boris Silaev ordered

    ministers and enterprise heads to pay all wage and pension

    arrears and social allowances by the end of the year. Those

    debts total $12.3 million. LF

    [10] ANOTHER PROTEST DEMONSTRATION IN KYRGYZ

    CAPITAL

    Groups of 200-300 Bishkek residents blocked

    major highways in the city on 2-3 December to protest the

    government's failure to negotiate an agreement with

    Uzbekistan on the resumption of natural gas supplies for

    heating purposes, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported. A

    similar protest took place one week earlier (see "RFE/RL

    Newsline," 29 November 1999). Uzbekistan halted gas

    supplies in mid-November in retaliation for Kyrgyzstan's $4

    million unpaid debts for previous supplies. LF

    [11] TAJIK OPPOSITION PARTY RE-REGISTERED

    The Ministry of

    Justice on 3 December formally registered the Democratic

    Party of Tajikistan (Almaty platform), Asia Plus-Blitz reported.

    The Democratic Party of Tajikistan first registered in

    September 1991 but was banned in June 1993, after which it

    split into two groups. One group distanced itself from the

    United Tajik Opposition and was registered in 1995 as a new

    organization, the Democratic Party of Tajikistan (Tehran

    platform.) The Ministry of Justice lifted its ban on the

    Democratic Party of Tajikistan (Almaty platform) and three

    other parties in August (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 12 August

    1999). LF

    [12] UZBEKISTAN HOLDS PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS

    More

    than 93 percent of Uzbekistan's 12.7 million electorate cast

    their votes on 5 December in elections to the 250-deputy

    parliament. All seats were contested in single-mandate

    constituencies. Five political parties, none of which is in

    opposition to the country's leadership, contended the poll.

    The OSCE sent only a 17-person assessment mission, rather

    than a fully-fledged observer mission, saying that given the

    ban on two opposition parties the election process could not

    be considered democratic. LF


    [B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

    [13] TRAJKOVSKI WINS MACEDONIAN PRESIDENTIAL VOTE...

    Boris Trajkovski of the center-right Internal Macedonian

    Revolutionary Organization (VMRO-VPMNE) defeated Social

    Democrat Tito Petkovski on 5 December by a margin of some

    69,000 votes. Trajkovski told supporters in Skopje: "It is time

    for us to deal with a serious matters now that this long, long

    process is over. The stability and security of the country

    have been preserved," Reuters reported. The election was a

    partial re-run of the 14 November ballot, which the Social

    Democrats claimed involved fraud in some 230 polling

    stations, primarily ones in areas inhabited by the ethnic

    Albanian minority (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 29 November

    1999). The latest vote yielded almost identical results to the

    earlier ballot. Trajkovski's party is the senior partner in the

    governing coalition, which also includes the Democratic

    Alternative and Democratic Party of the Albanians. PM

    [14] ...BUT WILL SOCIAL DEMOCRATS ACCEPT?

    Social

    Democratic officials said in Skopje on 5 December that the

    latest round of voting contained "widespread irregularities,"

    AP reported. They added that they will demand that the

    Supreme Court declare the ballot invalid. Earlier that day,

    several Albanians told Western news agencies that they

    believe the Social Democrats do not recognize the Albanians'

    right to take part in political life. Observers suggested that a

    victory for Petkovski could have strained relations between

    the ethnic Macedonians and the Albanians, who constitute

    about 23 percent of the population. During the campaign,

    Petkovski made many statements that offended Albanian

    public opinion. PM

    [15] OSCE REPORT: SERBIAN VIOLENCE IN KOSOVA WAS

    PLANNED

    The OSCE released a report in Vienna on 6

    December that argues that the "cycle of violence has not yet

    been broken" in Kosova. The study shows that the violence

    committed by Serbian forces in the first half of 1999 was part

    of a deliberate, planned campaign aimed at driving the ethnic

    Albanian majority from the province. "Everywhere the attacks

    on communities appear to have been dictated by strategy,

    not by breakdown in command and control," the report

    noted. Violence by ethnic Albanians is also discussed, but the

    study notes that "the sheer scale and the involvement of the

    [Serbian] state make the [violence carried out by Serbian

    forces] of a structurally different order" than that committed

    by Albanians. The report highlights the deliberate killing of

    children, the elderly, and the disabled by Serbian forces as

    well as violence against elderly Serbs by Albanians. PM

    [16] SERBIAN POLICE ARREST KOSOVAR DEFENSE LAWYER

    Natasa Kandic, who is one of Serbia's leading human rights

    activists, told Reuters in Belgrade on 5 December that police

    arrested Teki Bokshi two days earlier. The ethnic Albanian is

    a defense attorney for some 2,000 Kosovars being held in

    Serbian jails. He was travelling back to Belgrade from visiting

    clients in Sremska Mitrovica at the time of his arrest. Kandic

    added that she does not know where Bokshi is being held.

    She stressed that she believes that the police are trying to

    "stop our work" in defending ethnic Albanians in court. PM

    [17] KOSOVAR 'GOVERNMENT' TO ISSUE PASSPORTS

    The self-

    styled "provisional government of Kosova," which is backed

    by the former Kosova Liberation Army (UCK), said in a

    statement in Prishtina on 4 December that it will soon issue

    passports. The move follows an earlier announcement by the

    UCK-backed government that it will issue identity cards,

    RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. Neither the

    government nor its documents are recognized by the

    international community, including the UN civilian administration

    in Kosova. The Belgrade authorities recently reported that

    they have issued 5,000 Yugoslav passports and 600 identity

    cards to Kosovars in the past three months. PM

    [18] EU OIL TRUCKS REMAIN STUCK ON SERBIAN BORDER

    EU

    officials decided in Brussels on 3 December to send the 14

    trucks carrying fuel oil for Nis and Pirot back to Macedonia

    from the border crossing into Serbia, where Serbian customs

    officials have blocked their entry (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 2

    December 1999). Serbian customs personnel refused,

    however, to allow the trucks to return to Macedonia.

    Meanwhile, the EU must pay Serbian customs $64 per truck

    each day in "parking fees," Reuters reported. Michael Graham,

    head of the EU mission in Belgrade, told AP on 5 December

    that the incident is an expression of Belgrade's "ill will." He

    commented that "if this were an isolated question, I wouldn't

    be so worried, but it's not. This delay came after a series of

    other obstacles." Nis Mayor Zoran Zivkovic added that "the

    dirty game continues." PM

    [19] DRASKOVIC PARTY TO SHUN SERBIAN SHADOW CABINET

    Dragoslav Avramovic, who is former governor of the National

    Bank and one of Serbia's most popular public figures, said in

    Belgrade on 4 December that he does not object to

    proposals from some opposition leaders to form a shadow

    cabinet. Avramovic has been widely discussed as the most

    likely candidate to head any government formed by the

    opposition. Predrag Simic, who is an adviser to the Serbian

    Renewal Movement's (SPO) Vuk Draskovic, said his party will

    not participate in a shadow government, which Simic called "a

    waste of time and energy." Observers suggest that the SPO

    still hopes to cut a deal with the regime, with which it shares

    a nationalist and anti-Western outlook. Draskovic served as

    Yugoslav deputy prime minister until 28 April 1999. PM

    [20] ALBANIAN DEMOCRATS TRADE CHARGES OF

    CORRUPTION

    Genc Pollo, who is a former top aide to

    Democratic Party leader and ex-President Sali Berisha, said in

    Tirana on 5 December that Berisha "used family members to

    pocket large amounts of money from local businessmen and

    buy property in New York," dpa reported. Pollo also charged

    that Berisha made $100,000 from a now defunct pyramid

    investment company and had other questionable business

    interests. The Democratic Party said in a statement that

    Pollo's charges are "fabrications." Two days earlier, a

    spokesman for Berisha said that Pollo has dubious business

    connections and illegally acquired two "luxury apartments" in

    central Tirana. Pollo is a member of the parliament but

    resigned his party offices after failing to defeat Berisha for

    the party chairmanship in October (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 4

    October 1999). PM

    [21] CROATIAN GOVERNING PARTY WANTS VALENTIC AS

    PRIME MINISTER...

    The Croatian Democratic Community (HDZ)

    said in a statement on 3 December that it will nominate

    former Prime Minister Nikica Valentic to head a HDZ-led

    government after the 3 January elections. The statement

    added that Vladimir Seks will become speaker of the

    parliament if the HDZ wins the vote. The BBC's Croatian

    Service noted on 6 December that the HDZ is apparently

    influenced by unspecified recent public opinion polls that rate

    Valentic as the most popular prime minister and Seks as the

    most competent faction manager in the parliament. PM

    [22] ...BUT WHAT ABOUT GRANIC?

    RFE/RL's South Slavic Service

    noted on 3 December that missing from the list of top

    candidates is Foreign Minister Mate Granic. Recent polls in

    "Jutarnji list" show that he is the only HDZ leader who could

    possibly defeat Social Democrat Ivica Racan in a presidential

    election. Valentic told "Jutarnji list" of 6 December that Granic

    would be the best presidential candidate for the HDZ in a

    post-Tudjman era. Valentic added that he is confident that he

    and Granic as top candidates will enable the HDZ to "obtain 5

    to 10 percent more votes" than would otherwise be the

    case. PM

    [23] ROMANIAN RAILWAY WORKERS GO ON STRIKE

    Railway

    workers throughout Romania went on strike on 6 December

    to demand a 70 percent wage increase and improved

    working conditions. As a result of their action, some 60

    percent of railway traffic in the country came to a standstill.

    The previous day, Transportation Minister Traian Basescu

    offered to raise wages by 20 percent, but the unions

    rejected the offer. Basescu said if the government met the

    union's demands, prices for train tickets would go up by 40

    percent, which he described as "unacceptable now, when

    Christmas is coming," AP reported. While passenger train

    conductors have declared an unlimited strike, freight train

    conductors were expected to go back to work later in the

    day on 6 December. VG

    [24] ROMANIA HOOKED UP TO SOYUZ PIPELINE

    Romanian

    President Emil Constantinescu on 3 December attended a

    ceremony to open a new pipeline connection to the Soyuz

    gas pipeline that runs from Russia through Ukraine to

    Romania, ITAR-TASS reported. The new pipeline connection

    will allow Romanian to increase the annual amount of gas it

    imports from Russia by 2.3-4 billion cubic meters. VG

    [25] OSCE MISSION HEAD REACTS TO TRANSDNIESTER

    COMPLAINTS

    The head of the OSCE permanent mission to

    Moldova, William Hill, said the fact that Transdniester

    officials did not sign the OSCE agreement on the withdrawal

    of Russian troops from the breakaway region of Moldova

    does not mean that the agreement does not apply to the

    region, Infotag reported on 3 December. Hill was

    responding to complaints about the deal by Transdniester

    leader Igor Smirnov, who declared it "invalid" because no

    representatives from the region signed it (see "RFE/RL

    Newsline," 2 December 1999). "Not all countries signed the

    Universal Declaration of Human Rights or the Helsinki

    document either, but they are binding for all," Hill said. VG

    [26] BULGARIA ASKS TO BE REMOVED FROM EU VISA

    BLACKLIST

    Bulgarian Prime Minister Ivan Kostov on 3

    December said his country's accession to the EU would

    secure greater public support if the EU eased visa

    restrictions on Bulgarians, BTA reported. Kostov was

    speaking upon his return from a visit to the Netherlands

    and Belgium, where he brought up the issue with the

    leaders of those two countries and European

    Commissioner Romano Prodi. VG


    [C] END NOTE

    [27] A DECADE OF DISAPPOINTMENTS

    By Paul Goble

    The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 unleashed great

    expectations that the world was entering a new period of

    democracy, free markets, peace, and stability.

    But despite the undeniable progress almost everyone

    has made, the decade since that time has brought even

    greater disappointments, both in the countries that

    languished under communist domination as well as in those

    that had actively fought that political system.

    Such a sequence, of course, is typical of periods of

    massive change. As the Polish writer Adam Michnik points out

    in the current issue of the American journal "Dissent," "any

    great social change unleashes great expectations. And

    therefore, of course, it leads to great disappointments.

    This particular decade of disappointed expectations has

    had the unintended consequence of focusing attention on

    three aspects of the communist experience in the Soviet

    Union and Eastern Europe that many participants in and

    analysts of these developments have until now been largely

    unwilling to confront.

    First, communism was far more insidious, pervasive, and

    evil than even many of its sharpest critics have been

    prepared to acknowledge. As a result, overcoming its

    consequences requires a far greater effort over a longer

    period than many had earlier assumed.

    Not only did the communist regimes of the region kill

    millions of people and destroy their physical environment in

    the name of a supposedly higher good--something even

    former Communists now acknowledge; these regimes

    deformed the mental and moral make-up of the people living

    under them.

    The communist authorities were ultimately unsuccessful

    in reducing everyone to the status of "Homo Sovieticus." Had

    they been able to achieve that objective, these regimes

    might have survived far longer than they did. But they did

    have a major impact on those over whom they exercised

    their power, as any comparison of pre-communist and post-

    communist periods in these countries shows. Many of the

    most committed anti-Communists, however, had assumed that

    formally replacing communism as the ruling ideological system

    with democracy and free market economics would be

    sufficient to overcome up to seven decades of communist

    indoctrination.

    Second, Soviet domination of this region was never only

    about communism, and resistance to that domination was

    never only about communism, either. Instead, it was about

    nationalism and patriotism, values that the Soviet system

    sometimes actively exploited and at other times even more

    actively opposed.

    There remain enormous differences between those

    countries where indigenous groups imposed communism and

    those where a foreign occupying power did so. In the former,

    many people viewed the communist government as somehow

    their own, even if they hated it for what it did. In the latter,

    far more people viewed it as what it was, an occupying force

    that they would ultimately overthrow.

    During the communist period, this difference helped

    explain the pride many Russians took in the achievements of

    the Soviet state, even if they were suffering as much as

    anyone else from its rule. And it explains some of the impetus

    behind East European resistance to communist occupation,

    not only in 1956 and 1968 but in the struggle to overthrow

    communism a decade ago.

    But as important as these differences were in Soviet

    times, they have become even more significant in the post-

    communist period. It has proved far less difficult for those

    societies that always viewed communism as something

    foreign to turn away from than it has been for those that saw

    communism as part of their own national patrimony.

    To a large extent, this national dimension of communism

    and its collapse has been either ignored or downplayed by all

    involved. Any mention of it inevitably reopens the question of

    just what the Cold War was in fact about. And any discussion

    of this dimension of that conflict opens a variety of broader

    historical issues that political leaders both in the East and

    West believe are best resolved by being ignored.

    Third, the struggle between those who did the

    oppressing and those who were oppressed did not end just

    because the Berlin Wall fell and those who had called

    themselves Communists now call themselves something else.

    Largely because neither the international community nor

    the people in many post-communist countries were prepared

    to acknowledge the impact of communism on the minds and

    behavior of people living under it, there has been no genuine

    de-communization either of personnel or of ideas in the

    governing stratum.

    In many post-communist countries, especially those in

    which communism was viewed as something indigenous rather

    than imposed, the same people are in office today as under

    communism. They now style themselves as democrats, but in

    many cases they behave in ways little or no different from

    when they called themselves something else.

    And equally important, the people living under their rule

    continue to suffer from many of the things they suffered from

    in the past, even if those responsible now use different

    words. In some countries, like Uzbekistan, a new GULAG is

    being constructed; in others, the continuities with the past

    are less striking but equally significant.

    As a result, those concerned about human freedom are

    increasingly being forced to recognize that the defeat of

    communism did not mark the final victory in that struggle. Not

    surprisingly, some of them have grown discouraged and even

    opted out. But a growing number of people now understand

    that they must continue the fight, lest the victory of a

    decade ago be undermined by their own inaction or the

    actions of others.

    06-12-99


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


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