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RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 4, No. 135, 00-07-17Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty <http://www.rferl.org>RFE/RL NEWSLINEVol. 4, No. 135, 17 July 2000CONTENTS[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[C] END NOTE
[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA[01] ARMENIA, EU, IRAN DISCUSS ENERGY COOPERATIONRepresentativesof the EU have held talks in Yerevan with Armenian and visiting Iranian government officials on the EU's possible involvement in construction of the planned $120 million gas export pipeline from Iran to Armenia, Caucasus Press reported on 15 July. The Iranian delegation, headed by Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad Hossein Adeli and Deputy Oil Minister Ahmad Raagozar, also met with Armenian President Robert Kocharian, Prime Minister Andranik Markarian, and Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian, IRNA and Armenpress reported. During those talks Adeli welcomed the recently adopted program Armenian government program to develop the country's southern Meghri region, which borders on Iran (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 19 June 2000). Markarian proposed construction of an oil pipeline from Iran to Armenia and of a refinery in Meghri. LF [02] THREE ARMENIAN SOLDIERS DESERT, KILL EIGHTThree Armenianservicemen who deserted from their unit in Vardenis Raion in south-eastern Armenia on 13 July killed a total of eight people, including two police officers and a child, in two separate incidents later that day, Interfax and RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau reported. One of the three soldiers was wounded in the second shootout and was taken into custody on 13 July; the other two other were apprehended on 17 July. "Hayots ashkharh" reported on 15 July that shortly before, one of the three servicemen had been court-martialed for insulting his commanding officer. Prime Minister Markarian has expressed his condolences to the families of the eight people killed, Noyan Tapan reported. LF [03] AZERBAIJAN, RUSSIA DISCUSS CASPIANA Russian delegationheaded by Deputy Foreign Minister and presidential envoy for the Caspian Viktor Kalyuzhnyi met behind close doors in Baku on 13 July with Azerbaijan's President Heidar Aliev to discuss expediting an agreement between the five Caspian littoral states on the status of that sea, Turan and ITAR- TASS reported. Aliev said he believes disagreements on that issue can be resolved. Kalyuzhnyi also proposed creating a "strategic and economic center" to address Caspian-related problems, including ecological problems and commercial shipping. Meeting the following day with Natik Aliev, president of Azerbaijan's state oil company SOCAR, Kalyuzhnyi proposed that the Caspian littoral states agree to jointly develop oil and gas deposits whose ownership is disputed, including the Kyapaz (Serdar) field, to which both Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan lay claim, according to Turan. Kalyuzhnyi said ownership of four fields is disputed between Russia and Kazakhstan but that he does not consider Turkmenistan's claim to part of the Azerbaijani and Chirag oil fields valid. LF [04] GEORGIA, U.S. DISCUSS CLOSURE OF RUSSIAN MILITARY BASESDuring talks in Tbilisi on 14 July with Georgian PresidentEduard Shevardnadze, Minister of State Gia Arsenishvili, Foreign Minister Irakli Menagharishvili, and parliamentary speaker Zurab Zhvania, Ambassador Stephen Sestanovich, who is adviser on the CIS to the U.S. secretary of state, again said that the U.S. is prepared to meet part of the financial cost of the closure of Russia's military bases in Georgia, Russian agencies reported. A third round of Russian-Georgian talks on the timetable and conditions of the closure of those bases begins in Moscow on 29 July. Georgian Foreign Ministry spokesman Avtandil Napetvaridze said last week that Tbilisi will reject Moscow's proposal made last month that its base in Gudauta be transformed into a support center for the CIS peacekeeping troops currently deployed in Abkhazia (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 26 June 2000). Under an agreement signed last November, Moscow is to vacate that base by 1 July 2001. LF [05] GEORGIAN PRESIDENT, ADVISER APPEAR AT ODDS OVER ABKHAZPROTOCOL...In his traditional Monday radio broadcast on 17 July, President Shevardnadze expressed approval of the joint protocol signed in Sukhum on 11 July by Abkhaz and Georgian government representatives, Caucasus Press reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 12 July 2000). Shevardnadze termed that document a step toward establishing "normal relations" with the Abkhaz side. But Interfax on 14 July quoted Shevardnadze's adviser on international legal issues, Levan Aleksidze, as complaining that the protocol was hastily prepared and not adequately reviewed by the Georgian side and consequently contains formulations that have angered Georgians. Specifically Aleksidze condemned the pledge by both sides to take legal proceedings against persons calling for the use of force to resolve the conflict, pointing out that this could be applied to persons calling for military intervention in Abkhazia by the international community. LF [06] ...WHILE LEADER OF GEORGIAN DISPLACED PERSONS REJECTS THATDOCUMENTAlso on 14 July, Tamaz Nadareishvili, who is chairman of the Abkhaz parliament in exile, told Iprinda that the parliament will suspend cooperation with the Georgian leadership unless the latter abjures the 11 July protocol. Nadareishvili said the leadership of the parliament and government in exile is demanding a meeting with Shevardnadze and Zhvania to discuss that document (see "RFE/RL Caucasus Report," Vol. 3, No. 28, 14 July 2000). LF [07] GEORGIA SEEKS TO CO-OPT AUTHOR OF POLAND'S 'SHOCK THERAPY'Georgian presidential adviser for economic reform TemurBasilia told Caucasus Press on 15 July that on Shevardnadze's initiative an economic council will be established and headed by Polish economist Leszek Balcerowicz, who oversaw Poland's successful transition to a market economy. The World Bank is conducting talks with Balcerowicz on that issue, Basilia said. Shevardnadze in his 17 July radio broadcast said that the proposal that Tbilisi engage Balcerowicz's services originated in the U.S., which will cover all expenses involved, Caucasus Press reported. LF [08] ITALIAN POLICE RELEASE KAZAKHSTAN'S EX-PREMIERAkezhanKazhegeldin returned from Rome to London on 14 July after the Italian Ministry of Justice ruled there were no grounds for his further detention, Reuters reported. Kazhegeldin had been detained on his arrival in Rome two days earlier (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 14 July 2000). The 'Wall Street Journal" on 17 July quoted an unnamed Italian government official as saying that the Italian authorities had realized that the Kazakh government's request for Kazhegeldin's arrest may have been politically motivated. Kazhegeldin's lawyer Charles Both accused Astana of abusing the Interpol system in the hope of preventing Kazhegeldin's cooperation with an ongoing U.S. investigation into possible financial irregularities by top Kazakh officials, including President Nursultan Nazarbaev and Kazhegeldin's successor as premier Nurlan Balghymbaev. The Kazakhstan Prosecutor-General's Office told RFE/RL's Kazakh Service on 17 July, however, that Astana played no part in Kazhegeldin's detention by the Italian authorities. LF [09] BOMB KILLS ONE IN TAJIK CAPITALOne person was killed andfour people injured, including three children, when a jeep belonging to the EU's humanitarian mission exploded in Dushanbe on 16 July, Russian agencies reported. A bomb that exploded during the night of 12-13 July in a building adjacent to the Dushanbe police headquarters caused major damage but no injuries, "Nezavisimaya gazeta" reported on 15 July. President Imomali Rakhmonov convened a meeting of senior law enforcement officials on 13 July to discuss the crime situation, Asia Plus-Blitz reported. LF [B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE[10] MONTENEGRIN RULING PARTY ACCEPTS OPPOSITION OFFER OF TALKSSvetozar Marovic, who is the speaker of the Montenegrinparliament and a member of the governing Democratic Socialist Party (DPS), said in Podgorica on 15 July his party accepts an opposition offer of talks on the republic's political future (see "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 11 July 2000). "If they really want talks, we'll talk.... We [propose] that the talks start as early as next week," the private Beta news agency reported. Prime Minister Filip Vujanovic added that it is "exceptionally important" that his DPS enter talks soon with the Socialist People's Party (SNP), which is loyal to Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, and with the pro- independence Liberal Alliance, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported on 16 July. SNP leader Predrag Bulatovic said that "everyone who wants the best for Montenegro" should welcome Marovic's statement. PM [11] SLOVENIA PRESENTS MONTENEGRIN RESOLUTION TO UNSloveniandiplomats, acting on behalf of Montenegro, presented the Security Council on 14 July with a copy of the Montenegrin parliament's resolution rejecting Milosevic's recent constitutional changes (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 10 July 2000). Samuel Zbogar, who is Slovenia's deputy ambassador to the UN, wrote the council that his government considers the Montenegrin decision to be of "great importance, adopted in the crucial moments for the future of the Republic of Montenegro, as well as for the future of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia," AP reported. PM [12] NO BIG NEWS FROM SVETI STEFAN MEETINGLeaders of theMontenegrin government and Serbian opposition ended a one-day meeting in the resort town of Sveti Stefan on 14 June by issuing a "mildly-worded joint statement" that pledged themselves to further talks but to little else, Reuters reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 14 July 2000). That same day, army commanders headed by Chief-of-Staff General Nebojsa Pavkovic met in Podgorica to "assess the level of combat readiness and give instructions for concrete tasks in the coming period," Tanjug reported but did not elaborate. PM [13] EU PROMOTES CITY-TO-CITY COOPERATIONJavier Solana, who isthe EU's chief spokesman for foreign and security policy, is slated to host a group of mayors from EU countries and from Serbia, Montenegro, and Kosova on 17 July. He recently wrote EU mayors that the advent of "local elections in Serbia and in Kosovo in the autumn makes it even more urgent to consider how to step up cooperation with local cities and districts," Reuters reported. The Serbian mayors are from the opposition- run towns of Nis, Novi Sad, and Pancevo. The Kosova towns of Leposaviq, Gjilan, and Suhareka are also represented by their mayors, as is Podgorica. On the EU side are the mayors of Athens, Dortmund, Barcelona, Lille, Bologna, Konstanz, and the Paris suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt. PM [14] LARGE TURNOUT FOR KARADJORDJEVIC FUNERALMore than 3,000people attended the funeral of Prince Tomislav Karadjordjevic in Oplenac, Serbia, on 16 July, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 13 July 2000). Crown Prince Aleksandar led the mourners from the royal family. Serbian Orthodox Patriarch Pavle and Bishop Sava of Sumadija officiated. Mourners came from many places in the former Yugoslavia and from abroad. Among the political personalities present was former Republika Srpska President Biljana Plavsic, who called Tomislav a great friend and supporter of the Bosnian Serbs, "Vesti" reported. Known among his admirers as "the prince with a big heart," Tomislav was active in numerous charitable activities after returning from England to Serbia in 1991. Muslims and Croats in Bosnia tend to regard him as a Serbian nationalist. PM [15] PRESEVO ALBANIANS REPORT GROWING TENSIONSThe Party forDemocratic Action, whose leaders include Mayor Riza Halimi, said in a statement on 16 July that "the latest explosions [near Serbian military or government facilities] have been followed by rising political tensions and aggravation of citizens' security...mass searches of apartments and detentions of [ethnic] Albanians," Reuters reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 14 July 2000). The statement added that "a state of emergency is gradually being introduced in the area without being formally declared." It is clear that tensions are on the rise in southwestern Serbia, but reliable information on developments in the region is often difficult to come by. PM [16] VOTING REGISTRATION EXTENDED IN KOSOVA AMID DIFFICULTIESAnunspecified number of Belgian peacekeepers evacuated a group of OSCE election registrars from the mainly Serb town of Leposaviq in northern Kosova on 16 July. The troops intervened after receiving reports that some 40 hard-line Serbs were en route to Leposaviq from Mitrovica to disrupt the voting registration. On 14 July, Bernard Kouchner, who heads the UN's civilian administration in Kosova, extended the registration deadline from 15 to 19 July to enable potential voters, including a group of Serbs in Leposaviq, to register for the fall local elections. On 15 July, the moderate Gracanica-based Serbian National Council said in a statement that it urges Serbs to end their boycott of the elections and take part in them where sufficient security is assured, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. PM [17] SERBIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH BLOWN UPOn 16 July, an explosioninvolving 30 kilograms of unidentified explosive materials destroyed the medieval Church of the Holy Prophet Elijah near Fushe Kosova. The building had been extensively damaged during the 1999 conflict and was not guarded by NATO troops. KFOR is investigating, AP reported. PM [18] KOSOVAR ALBANIANS BLOCK HIGHWAYA wedding party of ethnicAlbanians blocked the Prishtina-Prizren road near the capital on 16 July after Swedish peacekeepers refused to let them fly the Albanian flag from their car, as is the local custom. The Swedes argued that displaying the flag would cause undue tensions in the Serbian village of Caglavica along the route. The Albanians responded that they fought for their flag in the 1999 conflict and demanded that KFOR assert its authority in all Serb-populated areas in the province. In the end, the Swedes returned the confiscated flag to the Albanians, AP reported. PM [19] MACEDONIAN ALBANIANS DEMONSTRATE FOR UNIVERSITYSome 2,000people demonstrated in Skopje on 15 July to demand that the underground Albanian-language university in Tetovo be transformed into a full-fledged state institution. They reject a compromise proposal from the OSCE aimed at making the university a recognized but private establishment (see "RFE/RL Balkan Report" 28 April 2000). The parliament is slated to vote on the OSCE proposal on 18 July, AP reported. The Tetovo university question is one of the most acrimonious in Macedonian politics. PM [20] BALKAN AGREEMENT IN OHRIDThe interior ministers of Albania,Bulgaria, and Macedonia agreed on unspecified joint measures to combat organized crime, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported on 16 July. The Macedonian and Albanian ministers also signed an agreement on preventing illegal traffic and migration across their common border. The Macedonian and Bulgarian ministers signed a similar pact in June. PM [21] CROATIAN PARLIAMENT REAFFIRMS PROPERTY RIGHTSIn a long-awaited move, the parliament on 14 July confirmed the right of all citizens to the property they owned before the 1991- 1995 war. In cases where a citizen is unable to re-acquire a former home or property, the government will provide assistance to enable them to obtain something similar, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. PM [22] HERZEGOVINIAN PARTY KEEPS JELAVICMeeting in Sarajevo on 15July, delegates to the party congress of the Croatian Democratic Community (HDZ) of Bosnia-Herzegovina re-elected hard-line chairman Ante Jelavic. He stressed that the HDZ is a "modern, centrist" party. Spokesman Zoran Tomic told Reuters that the HDZ's newly-adopted statute "formally and legally" made the party independent of its Croatian counterpart. The delegates did not elect the party's leading reformer, Foreign Minister Jadranko Prlic, to one of the five deputy positions. Prlic told reporters: "My political concept has not received a majority of votes, so now I will think about my future political engagement," dpa reported (see "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 27 June 2000). He told "Dnevni avaz" of 17 July that the HDZ "has closed the door to democratic change." Prlic added that he will make his future political plans known "in a few days." PM [23] ROMANIAN MINISTER SLAMS HUNGARIAN PRESSRomanianEnvironmental Minister Romica Tomescu said the Hungarian press misinformed the public when it claimed that the Aurul mining company, which caused the cyanide spill into Tisza River in January, resumed its operations with the approval of the authorities, Hungarian media reported on 15 July. Tomescu said that a trial run is under way at the mine and that all parties, including the Hungarian authorities, had been informed about it (see also "RFE/RL Newsline," 14 July 2000). In other news, lawyers representing two small business owners in Hungary's tourism industry have filed a lawsuit against Aurul, seeking compensation for loss of income due to the decrease in tourism along the Tisza. MSZ [24] ALLIANCE FOR ROMANIA REMAINS AMBIVALENT ON ELECTORAL PACT...The National Council of the Alliance for Romania (APR) on 14July named APR leader Teodor Melescanu as the party's candidate in the fall presidential elections and said talks with the national Liberal Party (PNL) on setting up "a new political structure" will continue. The APR says its main condition for the continuation of the discussions with the PNL is support for Melescanu as president and Stolojan as premier. Negotiations with the PNL are to continue throughout August and a decision is to be taken by the National Convention in September, RFE/RL's Bucharest bureau reported. Meanwhile, preparations for running on separate lists are to continue, and Melescanu said talks will begin on a post- electoral coalition with the Party of Social Democracy in Romania and with the Democratic Party. MS [25] ...WHILE LIBERALS ARE EMBROILED IN CONFLICTFinance MinisterDecebal Traian Remes on 15 July tendered his resignation in protest against the PNL's decision to continue negotiations with the APR. PNL National Council Chairman Nicolae Manolescu also resigned from the party, and the PNL's decision was criticized by many other prominent PNL council members. The resignations followed the PNL National Council's decision of the same day to continue talks with the APR and postpone deciding on the alliance's future until 18 August, when an extraordinary PNL congress is to be convened. This decision was virtually forced on the council by PNL First Deputy Chairman Valeriu Stoica, who one day earlier had received an endorsement from 39 out of the 46 local branches chairmen to continue the talks and convene an extraordinary congress. MS [26] ROMANIAN PEASANT PARTY SAYS PNL SHOULD QUIT GOVERNMENTNational Peasant Party Christian Democratic (PNTCD) FirstDeputy Chairman Ioan Muresan said on 16 July that the PNL cannot remain in government and hold talks with the opposition at the same time. He added that it would be "normal" for the PNL to withdraw from the cabinet. On 14 July PNTCD Chairman Ion Diaconescu accused the PNL of "duplicity" and said running on joint lists is no longer possible, regardless of the outcome of the negotiations the PNL is conducting with other formations. MS [27] ROMANIAN PARLIAMENT TO POSTPONE RATIFYING MOLDOVAN TREATY?Romanian parliamentary deputy Mihai Dorin told journalists inChisinau on 14 July that the Romanian parliament will postpone ratifying the basic treaty with Moldova. The treaty was initialed by the two countries' foreign ministers in Chisinau in late April. Dorin, a PNTCD member, said the Romanian parliamentary deputies are now primarily preoccupied with the fall election campaign. Deputy Petru Bejenaru, a member of the Party of Social Democracy in Romania (PDSR), said his formation has "doubts" whether the treaty will be approved and objects in particular to the compromise formulation mentioning "a common language" instead of "the Romanian language." Bejenaru also said the PDSR is opposed to the failure to mention in the treaty the 1939 Ribbentrop- Molotov pact, Romanian radio reported. MS [C] END NOTE[28] 'OFFICIAL' RELIGION AND 'UNOFFICIAL' FAITHby Paul GobleAn official at Turkmenistan's Council for Religious Affairs has acknowledged that his government agency controls the selection, promotion, and dismissal of all Sunni Muslim mullahs and Russian Orthodox clergy in that republic. Last week, Mered Chariyarov, a longtime official at the Turkmenistan Council, told a representative of the Keston Institute, an Oxford-based religious rights watchdog organization, that his state body has registered only Sunni Islam and Russian Orthodox Christianity and actively controls the assignment of Muslim mullahs and Christian priests and hierarchs. That policy leaves Turkmenistan in violation of the principles of the OSCE. Indeed, it could become the basis for Ashgabat's expulsion from that organization. But what is more significant, it also threatens to recreate the Soviet-era division between tightly controlled "official" Churches and often radicalized "unofficial" religious activities. The re-emergence of such underground religious groups, particularly among Muslims who had significant experience with them in Soviet times, could contribute to the rise of precisely the kind of fundamentalist challenge to political stability in Central Asia that both regional leaders and many outside powers say they most fear. As was the case during the Soviet period, both the requirement for registration and the ability to assign religious leaders appear to give the government enormous power over those believers who do register: the regime is allowed to pressure religious leaders into cooperating with the state by informing on their congregations or even to place secret police agents in place of genuinely religious people. But this Soviet approach also had the effect of depriving the mullahs and Christian clergy who participated in such "official" Churches of their authority and of driving many of the religious leaders and their followers underground into "unofficial" congregations far beyond the control of the state and often in clear opposition to it. For no other faith was that trend greater than Islam. On the one hand, Islam does not have a clergy as such. Any believer who can read the Koran can serve as a leader. And on the other, the communist authorities were contemptuous of Islam, an attitude that appears to have made them particularly clumsy in promoting their own "official" version. Indeed, across Central Asia, followers of what was sometimes called "underground" or the "non-state" version of Islam simultaneously subverted efforts by the Communist Party authorities to maintain control and provided a popular foundation for the small, pro- independence parties that emerged at the end of the Soviet period. With the collapse of Soviet power, many expected that this system of official registration and government intervention in the lives of religious groups would end. Some thought that an end to government interference would be a hallmark of the expected democratic transformations of their countries. Many others had that expectation because they believed the authorities would recognize how counterproductive such involvement was. But nowhere has the state entirely withdrawn from its involvement with religion. Virtually all post-Soviet governments have retained the Soviet practice of requiring religious groups to register with the authorities in order to operate legally, and most have kept the Soviet-style councils for religious affairs to monitor the situation often, as in Turkmenistan, with the same officials in the same positions. Until now, however, none of these regimes has admitted to using these councils to control the assignment of religious leaders. It is possible that Turkmenistan is the only one that is now doing so, but both the existence of similar councils in other post- Soviet states and the continuity in structures and personnel in these bodies in many of them suggest that the Turkmenistan admission indicates a far larger problem. Nowhere is this problem likely to be greater than across the predominantly Islamic countries of Central Asia. To the extent that governments there are following Ashgabat's lead, they seem certain to produce precisely what they say they most fear: a religious population increasingly alienated from governments that appear, as did the Soviet regime until the very end, far more powerful and stable than they in fact are. 17-07-00 Reprinted with permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
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