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RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 4, No. 224, 00-11-17Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty <http://www.rferl.org>RFE/RL NEWSLINEVol. 4, No. 224, 17 November 2000CONTENTS[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[C] END NOTE
[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA[01] U.S. MILITARY OFFICIALS VISIT ARMENIARichard Myers, who is deputy chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, held talks in Yerevan on 15 November with Armenian President Robert Kocharian, who affirmed Yerevan's readiness to broaden military cooperation with the U.S., Interfax reported. The two men also discussed regional security issues and the prospects for resolving the Karabakh conflict. Myers met the following day with Armenian Defense Minister Serzh Sarkisian, who briefed him on the recent redeployment of Russian military hardware from Georgia to Armenia. Sarkisian stressed that that redeployment does not violate Armenia's CFE commitments. Myers and Sarkisian also discussed possible U.S. aid for a planned Armenian peacekeeping force, according to ITAR-TASS. LF[02] AZERBAIJANI OPPOSITION, BAKU AUTHORITIES AGREE ON PLANNED PROTEST MARCHRepresentatives of Azerbaijani opposition parties and the Baku municipality reached agreement on 16 November that a protest march in the city scheduled for 18 November will follow the route proposed by the authorities, not that requested by the opposition, Turan reported. Musavat Party secretary Arif Hadjiev told the agency that the opposition had not insisted on its original demand in order not to create a pretext for the authorities "to aggravate the situation." He predicted that at least 30,000 people will take to the streets to protest the falsification of the 5 November parliamentary poll. Also on 16 November, the opposition Azerbaijan National Independence Party turned to the Appeals Court, claiming the election results were "totally falsified," Turan reported. LF[03] RUSSIA IMPOUNDS SWISS TRUCKS BOUND FOR GEORGIAThe Swiss government on 16 November confirmed that the Russian authorities in Rostov Oblast have detained a consignment of 50 trucks that are intended for the Georgian Ministry of Justice, Caucasus Press and ITAR-TASS reported. The vehicles are intended for the transportation of convicts. A senior Georgian Justice Ministry official has rejected as "absurd" the Russian claim that Tbilisi intends to pass the trucks to Chechen fighters. LF[04] GEORGIA SAYS RUSSIAN VISA MOVE 'ILLEGAL'Georgia's Foreign Ministry on 16 November formally protested Russian plans to impose a visa requirement on Georgian citizens travelling to the Russian Federation beginning on 5 December, Interfax and Caucasus Press reported. It also condemned as "destructive" a 14 November Russian Foreign Ministry statement announcing that residents of Abkhazia and South Ossetia will be exempt from the visa requirement. LF[05] KAZAKHSTAN OFFERS TO EXTEND BAIKONUR AGREEMENTAttending the launch of a Russian Progress cargo rocket from the Baikonur cosmodrome on 16 November, Kazakhstan's Prime Minister Qasymzhomart Toqaev said that Astana is willing to extend for a further 10 years the Russian lease of that facility, for which Moscow pays $115 million annually, Interfax reported. Toqaev said the original lease agreement signed in 1994 will not be "radically changed." LF[06] KYRGYZ PARLIAMENT AMENDS LAW ON STATE BUDGETThe lower chamber of the parliament on 16 November amended the law on the 2000 state budget, increasing revenues by 875.8 million soms to 11.6 billion soms (about $242 million) and expenditures by 1.52 billion soms to 12.07 billion soms (about $252 million), RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported. Most of the increase in expenditures (685 million soms) was used for defense and security purposes. Finance Minister Sultan Mederov told deputies that the increase in revenues resulted from the restructuring of Kyrgyzstan's debts to Russia and Turkey. LF[07] KYRGYZ OPPOSITION LEADER AGAIN CALLS FOR COOPERATION WITH AUTHORITIESFormer Kyrgyz Vice President and opposition Ar-Namys Party chairman Feliks Kulov told journalists in Bishkek on 16 November that his party will avoid at all costs a confrontation with the Kyrgyz authorities, Interfax reported. He said that his party plans to participate in the upcoming planned dialogue between the authorities and political parties. Kulov suggested that one of the topics of discussion at that forum be the passage of a law on dual citizenship, which, he said, would "significantly improve the mood of the Russian-speaking population in the country." Echoing his warning of one week earlier, Kulov said that popular discontent with the country's leadership is increasing in the wake of the disputed 29 October presidential poll (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 7 November 2000). LF[08] KYRGYZSTAN'S FIRST DEPUTY PREMIER RESIGNSBoris Silaev, one of a very few Russians to hold senior posts within the Kyrgyz leadership, announced his resignation on 15 November, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported. Silaev, who is 55 and a former mayor of Bishkek, said he will leave Kyrgyzstan shortly to take up permanent residence in Moscow, where Mayor Yurii Luzhkov has offered him a post in the city government. Silaev offered no explanation for his decision to leave Kyrgyzstan. LF[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE[09] YUGOSLAVIA TO RENEW RELATIONS WITH U.S., U.K., FRANCE, GERMANYThe Yugoslav government on 16 November announced it will restore diplomatic relations with the governments in Washington, London, Paris, and Berlin, AP reported. Yugoslav Premier Zoran Zizic said that "there is no harder moment for a government than the breakup of diplomatic relations, and there is no better moment than [re-]establishing them." Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica said that Belgrade is "returning to the world swiftly, its head [held] high and with dignity." He said Yugoslavia will focus its foreign relations on Europe and Russia but will establish diplomatic ties with all other countries, including "the most powerful country in the world--the U.S." British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook said: "We have always said that we would hold out the hand of friendship in the event of democratic change." He said ambassadors will be exchanged soon. PB[10] YUGOSLAV FOREIGN MINISTER TO IMPROVE RELATIONS WITH THE HAGUEGoran Svilanovic pledged on 16 November in Belgrade to improve Yugoslavia's relations with the UN war crimes tribunal at The Hague and allow prosecutors from the court to work in the country, AP reported. Svilanovic said that "visas will be issued to the tribunal's personnel, and they will be able to reopen their office in Belgrade and to be present here." All UN personnel pulled out of Belgrade shortly before NATO's air campaign in spring of last year. President Kostunica has criticized The Hague tribunal and said he will not send indicted war criminals to the UN court. Carla Del Ponte, the chief prosecutor of the tribunal, is expected to visit Belgrade in the coming weeks. PB[11] REFORMERS GIVE IN, SERBIAN GOVERNMENT MEETSSerbia's transitional government met for the first time on 16 November, as members of the reform Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS) decided to end their boycott over the presence in the government of Serbian security service chief Rade Markovic, AP reported. Nebojsa Covic, a DOS member and deputy premier in the cabinet, said "the citizens of Serbia can no longer wait because of somebody's stubbornness." He added that the urgency of pressing economic and social issues forced the DOS members to attend the government session, saying "we will insist on our demands that certain gentlemen resign... We will not wait much longer." Markovic is a close ally of former President Slobodan Milosevic. Elections to form a new Serbian government are to be held on 23 December. PB[12] SERBS TRICKLING BACK TO KOSOVAThe UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on 16 November that at least 1,000 Serbs who fled to Serbia proper have returned to Kosova on their own in recent months, Reuters reported. Maki Shinohara, a spokeswoman for the UNHCR in Belgrade, said: "I think we're no longer seeing an exodus from Kosovo; the situation has pretty much stabilized in that sense." She said those returning said security is not their main concern. "What they need is material assistance right now so that their returns can be sustained." An estimated 100,000-150,000 Serbs left Kosova after Yugoslav forces retreated from the province in summer 1999. PB[13] GUNMEN WOUND ETHNIC ALBANIAN POLITICIANTwo masked men shot and seriously wounded Shkelzen Hyseni, a newly-elected councillor from the moderate Democratic League of Kosova party, Reuters reported. Hyseni was shot in his Pec apartment on 15 November. He was transferred to the hospital in Prishtina; his injuries are life threatening. PB[14] KOUCHNER CALLS FOR PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS IN KOSOVA...The UN's administrator in Kosova, Bernard Kouchner, has called for parliamentary elections to be held in the Serbian province next spring, AP reported. Kouchner, addressing the UN Security Council in New York, said "we must act rapidly to organize elections throughout Kosovo to choose a parliament." He warned, however, that any moves to settle Kosova's future status "could very quickly lead to another conflict." He said the Security Council resolution giving the province "substantial autonomy" must be honored. And he added that it is important for Kosova to "speed the process of defining that substantial autonomy, and we must develop institutions in which the Kosovars will share more and more responsibilities in the administration of Kosovo." PB[15] ...SIGNALS EVENTUAL RESIGNATIONKouchner also indirectly told the Security Council the same day that he will soon leave his post as the UN's administrator in Kosova, although he did not give a date, saying "it depends on [UN Secretary-General] Mr. Kofi Annan." Kouchner, who took over the post in mid-1999, said he has met one possible successor for his job, former British Liberal Democratic Party leader Paddy Ashdown. Kouchner called Ashdown a "good one" but noted that the decision will be taken by Annan. Kouchner added that his address to the Security Council could very well be his final one. PB[16] CROATIAN NATIONALISTS THREATEN BOYCOTT OF BOSNIAN INSTITUTIONSThe nationalist Croatian Democratic Community (HDZ) said on 16 November that it will boycott all Bosnian institutions unless Western authorities reverse a decision to disqualify 13 of its candidates for breaking election rules, AP reported. In a statement, the HDZ said: "If the Provisional Election Commission of the OSCE mission fails to withdraw its decisions...the HDZ asserts it will not participate in the formation of new governments at any level." It also claimed the OSCE is disregarding "the will of the Croat people" and is using force to impose "the worst form of a protectorate." The OSCE decided earlier in the day to remove 10 HDZ candidates from regional assemblies because the party held an unauthorized referendum on election day. The OSCE considered that vote to be campaigning, which is forbidden on election day. Three others were banned from holding office because they obstructed an OSCE audit, violating campaign finance rules. PB[17] HIGH COMMISSIONER ANNULS BOSNIAN POLICE DISMISSALSWolfgang Petritsch on 16 November ordered the country's Muslim-Croatian Federation to reinstate two financial police inspectors who were dismissed while conducting investigations, Reuters reported. The two inspectors were suddenly dismissed while taking part in important corruption investigations (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 9 November 2000). PB[18] SLOVENIAN PARLIAMENT APPROVES NEW PREMIERThe parliament has approved Janez Drnovsek as prime minister, AP reported on 17 November. The vote for Drnovsek was 61 to five. Drnovsek, 50, said "the program of this government will be neither shock therapy nor careful management, but the revision of current laws." Deputies from the Social Democrats and the New Slovenia Party of outgoing Premier Andrej Bajuk, abstained from the vote in protest over committee assignments. Drnovsek's Liberal Democratic Party signed a coalition pact with the United List of Social Democrats (reformed Communists) and two smaller parties. The coalition will have 58 out of the 90 seats in the parliament. PB[19] CROATIAN BUSINESS LEADERS IN BELGRADEAbout 1,000 Croatian and Serbian business executives met in Belgrade on 16 November to help re-establish economic relations, Reuters reported. Nevenka Zecevic, an official from the Croatian Trade Ministry, said the meeting "has to bind the two governments to start creating a framework to enable normalization and strengthening of economic cooperation." Representatives from some 250 Croatian firms attended the meeting. Bilateral trade between the two countries, which was roughly $1 billion before the wars of Yugoslav succession, was only $26.5 million in 1999. PB[20] EXPLOSION AT CROATIAN BARRACK INJURES 21Croatian Defense Ministry officials said on 16 November that 21 soldiers were injured by a mortar blast during a training exercise at the Sveti Petar military base in Ogulin, Reuters reported citing the Croatian agency Hina. Defense Minister Jozo Rados told the government that four of the soldiers were seriously injured. He said the cause of the accident is being investigated. PB[21] ROMANIAN CHIEF OF CUSTOMS DISMISSEDFinance Minister Decebal Traian Remes dismissed Romanian Customs Office Director Nini Sapunaru on 15 November, Romanian media reported. Remes argued that Sapunaru used Customs Office funds for campaign purposes, while a Finance Ministry director said Sapunaru was dismissed because he did not have the necessary education for that post. A National Liberal Party (PNL) member, Sapunaru declared that Remes's decision was a political one and that the minister is waging a "personal war" against his former party, the PNL. Sapunaru called his dismissal illegal, arguing that the minister broke legislation on the status of public servants. Remes, who quit the PNL last August, joined the National Peasant Party Christian Democratic on 14 November. The media noted that Sapunaru's dismissal came a day after he and Remes argued publicly at a private television station. ZsM[22] FITCH IBCA UPGRADES ROMANIA'S RATINGThe Fitch IBCA rating agency has upgraded Romania's rating for long-term debt in foreign and domestic currency from B- to Ba+, BBC's Romanian Service reported. According to a Romanian Finance Ministry press release, the short-term rating stays unchanged at B, and the long-term general perspective remains stable. However, the report warns that the B rating puts Romania among the worse-rated countries, as it is still "vulnerable to internal and external shocks." The report also urges that the government formed after the 26 November elections continue economic reform. "Ziarul Financiar" quoted a Standard & Poor's expert as expressing surprise at the "changing of the rating of a country two weeks before elections." ZsM[23] RUSSIAN, MOLDOVAN OFFICIALS MEET IN MOSCOW OVER TRANSDNIESTER ISSUEValeriu Sturza, the president of the Moldovan Commission for the Transdniester Region, met in Moscow on 16 November with Yevgenii Primakov, the head of Russia's Transdniester commission, AP Flux reported. The two sides agreed to schedule for the beginning of December a meeting that would be devoted to trying to finding ways to solve the Transdniester problem, Sturza told AP Flux. The meeting will be attended by officials from Moldova, Russia, Ukraine, the self-declared Transdniester Republic, and the OSCE. ET[24] COUNCIL OF EUROPE HEAD LAUNCHES HUMANITARIAN APPEAL FOR ILASCUWalter Schwimmer, the general-secretary of the Council of Europe, asked separatist Transdniester authorities on 16 November to allow foreign doctors to examine Moldovan lawmaker Ilie Ilascu, who has been sentenced to death by Transdniester officials, AP reported on 17 November. Ilascu was sentenced to death on charges of terrorism. He opposed pro-Russian separatist forces who took up arms in 1992 and won control of the eastern part of Moldova, known as the Transdniester, and declared a mini-state that has not been recognized. Ilascu, who is also a candidate for Romanian parliament in the upcoming elections there, has complained of health problems and insufficient food. ET[25] MOLDOVAN GOVERNMENT TO SELL ARMY'S LAST SIX JET FIGHTERSMoldova is considering selling its last six MIG-29 jet fighters, AP Flux reported on 17 November, quoting Defense Ministry sources. Moldova wants to sell the planes because it cannot afford the cost of maintaining them. The ministry pledged to make public negotiations with any possible buyer. ET[26] BULGARIAN PRESIDENT URGES POLICE VIGILANCE AFTER SECOND BOMB ATTACKPetar Stoyanov called for the "full mobilization and concerted efforts" by police and other security forces after a casino owner died in a bomb blast, the second such incident in two days, dpa reported. The latest explosion took place in the Sofia suburb of Bojana, where the presidential residence is located. It killed a 27-year-old casino owner who had a minor criminal record. Police suspect organized crime to be behind both this explosion and the blast the previous day at the Ambassador Hotel (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 16 November 2000). Two people died in the latter incident. A spokesman for the opposition Socialists said the bombings are the latest incidents to show that the government and the Interior Ministry cannot counteract the increase in crime. PB[C] END NOTE[27] JOURNALIST'S ALLEGED ASSASSINS ON TRIAL IN MOSCOWBy Sophie LambroschiniEarlier this week, a military court in Moscow's decrepit 19th-century Matrosskaya Tishina prison began the reading of an 800-page indictment of six men accused of murdering journalist Dmitrii Kholodov in October 1994. The full reading of the charges against five former paratroopers and a paratrooper-turned-businessman could take up to 10 days. Kholodov's murder triggered outrage in the capital. It was widely perceived as post-communist Russia's first contract killing against a journalist because of his investigative work. Kholodov was killed by a booby-trapped briefcase that he had been told contained important documents. At the time, the 27-year-old reporter for the feisty "Moskovskii komsomolets" was investigating cases of graft in the Western Army Group, which had just pulled out of eastern Germany. Kholodov had accused the Western Group of setting up what he called a "mafia" to illegally sell planes, helicopters, and thousands of tanks. The then defense minister, Pavel Grachev, was often the direct or indirect target of accusations or allegations of corruption by Kholodov and other journalists. The assassination occurred only three years after the Soviet era, and censorship appeared to have ended. Its effect--and perhaps its intention-- was to frighten journalists away from sensitive subjects. Vladimir Kosarev, head of the Defense Ministry's information department at the time, told RFE/RL: 'They scared them, they really did scare them. I know journalists who really became more careful after that. [Military affairs reporter] Aleksandr Zhilin, who was working then for 'Moskovskie novosti,' kept out of sight for several months, and he wasn't the shy sort. It's certainly possible that this reaction--the fright--was what was intended, but I don't have the evidence to confirm that." In its indictment, the prosecution rules out any contract killing. It accuses the six former paratroopers of having concocted the briefcase murder on their own initiative, simply to please the Russian Defense Ministry by ridding it of a journalist seen as meddling in military affairs. The six defendants, who have already spent up to two years in jail, all pleaded innocent to the charges. They say the case against them is based mainly on testimony that has been retracted since it was first given. Last week, when the trial formally opened, the daily "Vremya novostei" tried to give the prosecution's view of the murder. According to the newspaper, the prosecution believes the idea for the assassination came from Colonel Pavel Popovskikh, former head of the paratroopers' intelligence department. In 1994, Popovskikh was often present at meetings presided over by Grachev where the minister lashed out at journalists' criticisms of the army. According to "Vremya novostei," the prosecution contends that in order to ingratiate himself with Grachev, Popovskikh decided to teach journalists a lesson. The daily says Popovskikh asked two paratroopers from an engineering regiment, Aleksandr Soroka and Vladimir Morozov, to make the bomb and booby-trap a brief case, and the two involved four other alleged accomplices. Eventually, Kholodov was told in a mysterious phone call that he would find documents relevant to his investigation in a briefcase left in a Moscow train station locker. Kholodov went to the station, picked up the briefcase, took it back to his office, and opened it. He was killed almost instantly. The defense, however, says that this entire scenario is based largely on the testimony of a single soldier who was serving in the same regiment as the alleged bomb-makers and has since retracted his accusations. The defense also notes that one of the indicted former paratroopers, who first admitted his guilt, has since also retracted his testimony. At the time of the murder, Kholodov was due to speak out at a State Duma hearing on corruption in the army. In addition, the dismissal of a Western Group general some weeks after Kholodov's murder implicated the Defense Ministry even further. Deputy Defense Minister Matvei Burlakov--who commanded the Western Group until it left Berlin--was fired by former President Boris Yeltsin because of what was called "on-going investigations" and to "save the honor of the armed forces." Burlakov was regarded as a close associate of Grachev. Former Defense Ministry information chief Kosarev confirms that Grachev was furious at the time about articles that had raised suspicions of corruption about himself or the Western Group. "Indeed, [Kholodov's articles] irritated the heads of the Defense Ministry at the time--I mean, above all, Minister Pavel Grachev. Sometimes they enraged him to the point where he screamed. He would get indignant, saying, 'That little kid allows himself to cover me in mud.' Not only that, at ministry meetings, I would be rebuked for not stopping this flow of criticism." Over the years, many journalists have expressed their concern that Kholodov's murder will never be solved. Some fear the ex-paratroopers may be only scapegoats in a case that involves individuals much higher up the military ladder. Reporting on the trial earlier this week, the private NTV station commented that "one accused is missing--the seventh one, the one who ordered the murder." The author is an RFE/RL correspondent based in Moscow. 17-11-00 Reprinted with permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
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