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RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 5, No. 170, 01-09-07Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty <http://www.rferl.org>RFE/RL NEWSLINEVol. 5, No. 170, 7 September 2001CONTENTS[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA
[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE
[C] END NOTE
[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA[01] ARMENIAN MINISTER SAYS INCREASED PHONE CHARGES ILLEGALThe increased per-minute telephone charges introduced by the Greek-owned Armenian telecommunications monopoly ArmenTel have not been approved by the Armenian government and therefore have no legal force, Armenian Transport and Communications Minister Andranik Manukian said in Yerevan on 6 September, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reported. Manukian said the Armenian leadership may take legal action against ArmenTel for violating the terms of its operating license if it tries to enforce the new charges. The Greek telecommunications giant OTE insists that under the terms of the 1998 deal whereby it acquired ArmenTel it is entitled to increase tariffs unilaterally. Justice Minister David Harutiunian said on 6 September that the dispute is likely to be referred to the international adjudication court. LF[02] ARMENIAN OPPOSITION PARTIES MULL NEW ALLIANCEMembers of the People's Party of Armenia (HZhK), Hanrapetutiun, and the National Accord Front (AHCh) told RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau on 6 September that the leaders of the three parties are holding talks on the text of a planned joint declaration calling for the resignation of President Robert Kocharian. Artashes Geghamian, one of the leaders of the AHCh and an outspoken critic of Kocharian, is believed to be pushing for a formal alliance between the three parties. Talks a year ago between Geghamian and HZhK Chairman Stepan Demirchian on forming an opposition alliance proved inconclusive. LF[03] PRESIDENTIAL PARTY CLAIMS VICTORY IN KARABAKH LOCAL ELECTIONSCandidates representing the Democratic Artsakh Union (ZhAM) that supports Arkadii Ghukasian, president of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, were elected to head local government bodies in at least 140 of the unrecognized enclave's 223 towns and villages in the 5 September elections, ZhAM Chairman Ashot Gulian told a correspondent for RFE/RL's Armenian Service in Stepanakert on 6 September. ZhAM candidate Hamik Avanesian was elected mayor of Stepanakert with some 53 percent of the vote; his closest rival, Maksim Mirzoyan of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation-- Dashnaktsutiun (HHD), polled 20 percent. The HHD won control of some 20 communities, mostly in the southern district of Hadrut, and endorsed independent candidates elected in a dozen other villages. Voter turnout was estimated at 60 percent. LF[04] AZERBAIJANIS PROTEST KARABAKH ARMENIAN DELEGATION'S BAKU VISITThe leaders of the opposition Musavat, Azerbaijan National Independence, and Azerbaijan Popular Front parties on 6 September cancelled a scheduled meeting with 11 members of the Karabakh NGO Helsinki Initiative-92 who arrived in Baku on 4 September, Turan reported. They were reportedly incensed by a statement made on his arrival in Baku by Karen Ohandjanian, the head of Helsinki Initiative-92, that Nagorno-Karabakh is an independent state. On 5 September, members of Azerbaijan's Organization for the Liberation of Karabakh staged a protest against the Armenians' presence in Baku outside the Azerbaijan NGO Helsinki Civil Assembly, which co-organized the Armenians' visit. Azerbaijani presidential administration official Ali Hasanov was quoted by Azerbaijan's Space TV on 6 September as expressing approval of the protests. It is not clear whether he was one of two presidential administration officials who met with the visiting Armenians on 6 September. LF[05] AZERBAIJANI OPPOSITION CONDEMNS NEWSPAPER'S CLOSUREThe opposition Adalet and Musavat parties have issued statements condemning as politically motivated and a violation of the principle of freedom of the press the ruling earlier this week by a Baku district court that the independent newspaper "Bakinskii bulvard" must cease publication, Turan reported on 6 September (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 5 September 2001). Also on 6 September, two Baku district courts warned publishing houses and distribution networks not to print or distribute any further copies of "Bakinskii bulvard." LF[06] PARLIAMENT APPROVES CANDIDATE FOR NEW GEORGIAN TAX MINISTERThe Georgian parliament's Committee for Taxes and Incomes on 6 September approved Levan Dzneladze, Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze's proposed candidate for the post of Tax Incomes Minister, Caucasus Press reported. Dzneladze is a 38-year-old trained economist who previously served as deputy finance minister and minister for state property management. He does not belong to any political party. Dzneladze replaces Mikhail Machavariani, who resigned last month to protest what he termed the "unrealistic" revenue targets set in the 2002 budget drafted by the Economy, Industry and Trade Ministry (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 16 August 2001). Machavariani has been appointed parliamentary secretary to parliament speaker Zurab Zhvania, Caucasus Press reported on 6 September. LF[07] GEORGIAN DEFENSE MINISTER DEMANDS MORE FUNDINGDefense Minister Davit Tevzadze told a 6 September session of the Georgian parliament's Committee for Defense and Security on 6 September that his ministry needs a minimum of 71 million laris ($34.3 million) in funding for 2002, Caucasus Press reported. "If we try to economize on military reform today, tomorrow we shall need additional expenditures to enhance the combat ability of the armed forces," Tevzadze argued. Shevardnadze said after a recent meeting with both Tevzadze and Finance Minister Zurab Nogaideli that the Defense Ministry will receive not less than 44 million laris in funding next year, but Nogaideli warned that it will not be possible to allocate more than 36 million. Tevzadze launched a last-minute bid for increased budget funding last fall during the protracted deliberations on the 2001 budget, but without success (see "RFE/RL Caucasus Report," Vol. 3, No. 47, 8 December 2000). LF[08] GEORGIAN RULING PARTY TO CONTEND ADJAR POLLThe Union of Citizens of Georgia (SMK) will nominate a rival candidate to run against incumbent Aslan Abashidze for the post of chairman of the Supreme Council of the Adjar Republic, Georgian parliament's Committee for Economic Policy and Reforms Chairman Vano Merabishvili told journalists on 6 September, according to Caucasus Press. A member of the SMK's Adjar organization had said that the party would not field a candidate in the 4 November ballot (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 4 September 2001). LF[09] KAZAKHSTAN'S PREMIER SAYS CPC PROBLEMS RESOLVEDThe disagreements over transport tariffs that have delayed the official launch of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium export pipeline from Tengiz to Novorossiisk have been resolved at a special meeting of consortium shareholders, Qasymzhomart Toqaev told journalists in Astana on 6 September, Interfax reported. Toqaev did not specify a date for the ceremony, but his deputy Vladimir Shkolnik told Interfax on 29 August that it would take place no later than 25 September. The 1,580-kilometer pipeline has already been filled with 1 million tons of oil. LF[10] ADB REVIEWS JOINT PROJECTS IN KAZAKHSTANToqaev met in Astana on 6 September with a team of experts from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) who are reviewing the progress of joint projects in Kazakhstan that the bank is cofinancing, Interfax reported. Those projects include reconstruction of the Almaty-Bishkek highway, which is being jointly funded by the ADB, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and the Kazakh government. The ADB has made loans totaling about $460 million to Kazakhstan over the past decade and plans to lend a further $120 million annually over the next three years. LF[11] KAZAKHSTAN'S PRESIDENT INAUGURATES NEW CASPIAN FERRY SERVICENursultan Nazarbaev attended a ceremony in the port of Aqtau on 6 September to mark the beginning of ferry services linking Kazakhstan with the ports of Olia (Russia), Baku (Azerbaijan), and Nowshahr (Iran), Interfax reported. He stressed the importance of those transport links for Kazakhstan's role as a transit country. The new ferry lines are part of the TRACECA transport network intended to link Central Asia and Europe via the Caucasus. LF[12] ANOTHER AMMUNITION DEPOT FIRE REPORTED IN KAZAKHSTANAn ammunition store at a military test site near Almaty was destroyed by fire during the night of 6-7 September, ITAR-TASS reported, quoting a spokesman for Kazakhstan's Agency for Emergency Situations. No one was injured in the blaze, the cause of which has not yet been established. A major blaze destroyed a huge munitions depot in Kazakhstan's northern Qaraghandy Oblast last month (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 14 and 21 August 2001). LF[13] IRANIAN FOREIGN MINISTER VISITS UZBEKISTANContinuing his tour of Central Asian capitals, Kamal Kharrazi arrived in Tashkent on 6 September where he discussed with his Uzbek counterpart Abdulaziz Komilov bilateral relations and regional security, Caspian News Agency and Interfax reported. The two men focussed particular attention on the threat posed by illegal drug trafficking, and called on the international community to consider new initiatives to end the civil war in Afghanistan, given that sanctions against the Taliban have not yielded the desired result. They suggested that the members of the so-called Six-Plus- Two group, to which both countries belong together with China, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan, and the U.S., should cooperate more closely in any new Afghan initiative. Kharrazi also met later on 6 September with President Islam Karimov, but no details of their talks were made public, according to AP. LF[B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE[14] NATO RESUMES ARMS COLLECTION IN MACEDONIAMacedonian parliament speaker Stojan Andov announced in the legislature on 6 September that "a total of 112 deputies voted [on a measure to approve a Western-backed political settlement]. Ninety-one voted for, 19 voted against, two abstained. I declare that the decision to begin [work on] amending the constitution of the Republic of Macedonia has been passed," RFE/RL reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 6 September 2001). Top officials of NATO, the EU, the U.S., France, and Germany publicly welcomed the vote. Guerrilla leader Commander Qeka told Reuters: "We were waiting for the vote and finally it has been achieved. This makes us 80 percent sure that the war is about to end, and we're willing to continue our cooperation." The next day, NATO officials said that the next stage in weapons collection of Operation Essential Harvest has begun. Ali Ahmeti, the political leader of the ethnic Albanian National Liberation Army (UCK), said that his guerrillas have released all Macedonian hostages they had been holding, dpa reported. An official of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) told the German news agency, however, that the ICRC is still looking for information about 14 missing Macedonians. PM[15] BOSNIAN SERB LEADER RETURNS TO BELGRADEFormer Bosnian Serb President Biljana Plavsic arrived in Belgrade from The Hague on 6 September, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 30 August 2001). She will remain until her trial in The Hague begins, which will be in February 2002 at the earliest. Upon arriving in the Serbian capital, she thanked the authorities there for facilitating her transfer. Justice Minister Vladan Batic, who was instrumental in obtaining her release, said that her arrival demonstrates that cooperation between Belgrade and The Hague works to the advantage of both sides. He said that an additional sign of the two-way cooperation will be the transfer to Belgrade from The Hague of documents dealing with financial and other crimes of the regime of former President Slobodan Milosevic. PM[16] DUBIOUS COURT APPOINTMENTS IN YUGOSLAVIABoth houses of the Yugoslav parliament voted on 6 September to approve President Vojislav Kostunica's two Serbian and two Montenegrin candidates to the Federal Constitutional Court, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic, whose government regards the federal authorities as not legitimate, did not approve the Montenegrin nominees. PM[17] VOTING REGISTRATION DEADLINE EXTENDED FOR SERBS IN KOSOVAThe UN civilian administration in Kosova has extended the deadline for Serbs to register to vote in the 17 November general election by two weeks to 22 September, Reuters reported from Prishtina on 6 September. OSCE representative Daan Everts said that the recent increase in the number of Serbs registering to vote has been "quite spectacular" (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 31 August 2001). He added that "if this [rate of registration] continues, in 14 days we will have most of the eligible Kosovo Serb voters inside Kosovo registered." In Berlin, Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Nebojsa Covic discussed the situation in Kosova and southern Serbia with Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. Covic said that the loss of mutual trust between local Serbs and Albanians is the greatest obstacle to ensuring a good turnout of Serbian voters. PM[18] SLOVENIA CALLS ON CROATIA TO SIGN AGREEMENTSpeaking in Ljubljana on 6 September, Prime Minister Janez Drnovsek called on the Croatian authorities to approve and sign the border agreement he negotiated with his Croatian counterpart Ivica Racan in July, Reuters reported (see "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 3 August 2001). Drnovsek stressed: "We have to warn that failure to sign the border agreement by Croatia would most likely cause a serious worsening of our relations... If the border agreement is not signed, we cannot be certain that our parliament will ratify the agreement on the Krsko [nuclear power] plant," which is in Slovenia but was built with Croatian and Slovenian money in communist times. He made his remarks after the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Croatian parliament postponed a discussion of the agreement that had been scheduled for that same day. PM[19] CROATIA OBTAINS WARRANT FOR WAR CRIMES SUSPECTAt Croatia's request, Interpol has issued an international arrest warrant for Croatian General Ante Gotovina, who is wanted by The Hague for war crimes, dpa reported on 6 September (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 1 August 2001). PM[20] GEORGIAN PRESIDENT IN ROMANIAVisiting Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze and his Romanian counterpart Ion Iliescu on 6 September agreed to reopen a ferry link between the Romanian port of Constanta and the Georgian port of Batumi, both on the Black Sea, Romanian media and international agencies reported. The route was closed in 1998 due to a lack of trade. Shevardnadze said the decision reflected the two countries' effort to reestablish the "Silk Road" between China and European countries. He also expressed the hope that in its capacity of rotating chair of the OSCE, Romania will help "solve territorial disputes" and promote efforts to evacuate "foreign bases" from Georgian territory. An accord for the mutual recognition of university degrees was also signed and the two presidents agreed to set up a joint commission to promote trade relations. Shevardnadze was to meet Prime Minister Adrian Nastase and the two chairmen of the Romanian parliamentary chambers on 7 September. Romania also announced it has decided to send aid to children in Abkhazia. MS[21] ROMANIA, IMF AGREE ON 'LETTER OF INTENTION'The International Monetary Fund delegation headed by Neven Mates, the fund's chief negotiator for Romania, has agreed with the government on the formulation of a "letter of intent" designed to make possible an accord on a new $400 million standby loan, Mediafax reported on 7 September. The terms of the agreement are to be discussed by the IMF board at a meeting in late October or early November. Mates said the agreement will cover a period of 18 months. MS[22] ROMANIAN PARTIES ENVISAGE MERGINGNational Liberal Party (PNL) Chairman Valeriu Stoica and Alliance for Romania (APR) Chairman Teodor Melescanu on 7 September decided to merge their formations, Mediafax reported. The merger is to be finalized by June 2002. The two leaders said in a press release that the merged formation, whose name is yet to be decided, will promote "the principles of modern, European liberalism." Melescanu, whose formation failed to gain parliamentary representation in November 2000, said that the merger stems from "the necessity of creating an alternative to the current ruling party" and from the fact that "the PNL and the APR share the same electorate." Earlier this week, Stoica called for parleys on creating a viable alternative to the ruling Social Democratic Party and mentioned as possible PNL partners in a merged formation the APR, the Democratic Party, and the extraparliamentary Union of Rightist Forces. MS.[23] ROMANIAN SENATE APPROVES ENDING CRIMINALIZATION OF SAME-SEX RELATIONSThe Senate on 6 September voted 83 to 32 in favor of approving a government ordinance that abolished Article 200 from the Penal Code, RFE/RL's Bucharest bureau reported (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 22 June 2001). The Senate thus heeded repeated criticism by the Council of Europe for its failure to decriminalize same-sex relations. The Greater Romania Party (PRM) voted against the amendment and PRM Senator Aron Belascu called it "a fatal error" and "a brutal [European] interference in Romanian legislation," which also attested to "the government's kowtowing to the Occident." MS[24] TRANSDNIESTER FREES DETAINED MOLDOVAN OFFICERThe separatists' authorities have released Major Iurie Cheibas from detention, Flux reported on 6 September. Cheibas, a member of the Moldovan military observers on the Joint Control Commission, was detained in Tiraspol on 2 September (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 6 September 2001). The Tiraspol authorities said they decided to liberate Cheibas "for humanitarian reasons" and "in order to avoid further tensioning the conflict" with Chisinau. The Moldovan authorities said the detention was "groundless" and that the information Cheibas collected in Tiraspol "cannot be considered secret." MS[25] ECUMENICAL PATRIARCH IN BULGARIAEcumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, arriving in Bulgaria on 6 September, said he "brings a message of love for the people" and added that he is "optimistic about the good prospects of prosperity for Bulgaria," BTA reported. Bartholomew II later met in Plodviv with Bulgarian Patriarch Maxim. He is attending the "Byzantine Cultural Heritage and the Balkans" conference there. MS[C] END NOTE[26] LUKASHENKA WANTS WIDE-MARGIN VICTORYBy Jan MaksymiukSpeaking to a conference of executive officials from all of Belarus at the end of July, incumbent Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka boasted that he would be re-elected on 9 September with 90 percent of the vote. But his confidence in voters' support seemed to somewhat decline three weeks later. Reacting to the opposition-publicized allegations that top state officials and he himself may be implicated in the abduction and the killing of prominent opposition figures in Belarus, Lukashenka told journalists that those charges have only inflated his popularity rating from 45 percent to 65 percent. He did not specify the opinion survey in which such a result was obtained, but subsequently mentioned the same figure -- 65 percent -- on several public occasions. That was a sufficiently clear indication to his administration that he would not mind obtaining such an election result. So far, Lukashenka has usually gotten what he wanted -- if not from voters, then from those who count the votes. Many developments in Belarus's current election campaign indicate that this time, too, Lukashenka will get what he wants. According to the Minsk-based Independent Institute of Socioeconomic Studies, which conducts regular and comprehensive public opinion polls in Belarus, Lukashenka's popularity rating over the past two years oscillated between 33 percent (the worst result in Lukashenka's presidential career, October 2000) and 47 percent (August 2001). Some Belarusian commentators have speculated that Lukashenka could win his re-election -- even if by an unimpressive margin -- in a free and fair ballot, especially in view of the fact that his rivals lack even a fraction of his political charisma and are hardly known to, let alone trusted by, most of the electorate. In this way, those commentators argued, Lukashenka could legitimize his rule and break his self-imposed isolation in the international arena. But Lukashenka decided not to take any risks in the presidential election -- this week he publicly announced that he does not care about any international recognition of the imminent ballot. OSCE monitors in Belarus are now very busy registering an avalanche of violations of election procedure by the authorities, including an unprecedented clampdown on the independent media and NGOs. The OSCE has taken great pains to prepare some 15,000 voluntary election observers in Belarus, despite Lukashenka's decree imposing draconian state control on foreign aid to Belarusian NGOs. Those observers -- branded by Lukashenka as the fifth column on the Western payroll -- were trained to register the regime's attempts at rigging the vote, even if they are powerless to intervene to prevent them. The Lukashenka-orchestrated constitutional referendum in 1996 and legislative election in 2000 have doubtless provided a lot of suitable material for OSCE election experts to analyze. It seems, however, that this time they will be confronted with an election technique that might have been overlooked or underestimated by them in 1996 and 2000, because it played a minor role on those past occasions. That technique is early voting. Under Belarus's election law, any voter can cast a vote five days ahead of the election date without giving any formal reasons for doing so. Reports by Belapan and RFE/RL's Belarusian Service this week suggest that the Belarusian authorities have launched a widescale but officially unadvertised campaign to urge and/or pressure voters to go to the polls early. During these five days of early voting, it is virtually impossible to ensure efficient monitoring of Belarus's 6,753 polling stations even by 15,000 observers, while the possibilities for the authorities and election officials to secretly replace cast ballots with falsified ones are practically unlimited. Independent observers want to tabulate official ballot results from 500 constituencies and thus announce preliminary nationwide results just hours after the polling stations are closed. The Central Election Commission only feebly objected to such an unofficial vote count. But it did object vehemently to exit polls by independent observers on 9 September, adding that police officers will prevent any such attempts. The point is that exit polls provide an estimate of real voting preferences, while the tabulation of official results from selected constituencies says only what was found in the ballot boxes when they were opened by election commissions. Quoting a "reliable source," Communist Party leader Syarhey Kalyakin -- a member of the campaign staff of unified opposition candidate Uladzimir Hancharyk -- said on 6 September that two days earlier all raion administration heads were provided with 20,000 blank voting ballots each in order to rig the election results on their territories in favor of Lukashenka. According to Kalyakin, the authorities want as many as 40 percent of voters to cast their votes early. In particular, Kalyakin divulged that the administration plans to replace a total of 560,000 ballots in Minsk Oblast in order to achieve 78 percent support for Lukashenka in that region. Kalyakin's revelations have yet to be independently confirmed, but their existence testifies to the fact that the opposition is well aware that such a falsification technique may be easily applied on a mass scale. It can, of course, be argued that this gloomy scenario for the "expression of people's will" on 9 September in Belarus may not necessarily take place. For example, there will be no need to "correct" the vote, because people will overwhelmingly vote for the incumbent president on their own. The problem is, however, that Belarus's current regime has taken every measure to undermine public confidence, both at home and abroad, in any result that may come out of ballot boxes handled by Lukashenka's people. And this also means that Lukashenka's election showing on 9 September -- be it 65, 78, or 90 percent -- will be no less questionable than the campaign practices he has exercised so far. 07-09-01 Reprinted with permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
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