Voice of America, 00-02-04

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CONTENTS

[01] U-N-H-C-R / KOSOVO (L ONLY) BY LISA SCHLEIN (GENEVA)

[02] SREBRENICA SURVIVORS / U-N (L-ONLY) BY BRECK ARDERY (UNITED NATIONS)

[03] AUSTRIA / FREEDOM PARTY BY RON PEMSTEIN (VIENNA)

[04] EU/AUSTRIA (L-ONLY) BY NICK SIMEONE (WASHINGTON)

[05] U-S / AUSTRIA (L) BY KYLE KING (STATE DEPARTMENT)

[06] GERMANY SCANDAL BY JONATHAN BRAUDE (BERLIN)

[07] NORTHERN IRELAND (L-ONLY) BY LOURDES NAVARRO (LONDON)

[08] NY ECON WRAP (S&L) BY ELAINE JOHANSON (NEW YORK)

[09] AUSTRIA'S NEW GOVERNMENT BY ANDREW GUTHRIE (WASHINGTON)

[10] FRIDAY'S EDITORIALS BY ANDREW GUTHRIE (WASHINGTON)

[01] U-N-H-C-R / KOSOVO (L ONLY) BY LISA SCHLEIN (GENEVA)

INTRO: The United Nations refugee agency, U-N-H-C-R, has suspended a bus service for minority communities in Kosovo following an upsurge of violence in the Yugoslav province. Lisa Schlein reports from Geneva.

TEXT: Since November, the U-N refugee agency has been operating eight bus routes for minorities stuck in isolated communities in Kosovo.

U-N-H-C-R spokesman Ron Redmond says the agency has shut down the bus service throughout the province following a rocket attack Wednesday on a bus near Kosovska Mitrovica. He says the bus was carrying 49 Serb civilians, two of whom were killed and three wounded.

[02] SREBRENICA SURVIVORS / U-N (L-ONLY) BY BRECK ARDERY (UNITED NATIONS)

INTRO: The United Nations is reacting cautiously to complaints against Secretary-General Kofi Annan and other top U-N officials, by survivors of the 1995 Serb massacre of Muslims in Srebrenica. V-O-A Correspondent Breck Ardery reports from the United Nations.

TEXT: A lawyer representing a group of Srebrenica survivors met with the U-N war crimes prosecutor at the Hague, to accuse Mr. Annan, former Secretary- General Boutros Boutros-Ghali and other U-N officials of creating conditions which led to the massacre. Thousands of Bosnian Muslims were murdered in July of 1995 when Serb forces took Srebrenica. At the time, the United Nations had declared Srebrenica a "safe area." The survivors claim U-N officials contributed to the massacre by their failure to protect Srebrenica. Asked about the accusation (Friday), the chief spokesman for Secretary-General Annan, Fred Eckhard, read a carefully-worded statement.

[03] AUSTRIA / FREEDOM PARTY BY RON PEMSTEIN (VIENNA)

INTRO: After four months of political negotiations, Austria has a government again -- the first one in three decades without the country's long-dominant Social Democrats. But Austria's new center-right coalition, led by Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel, faces diplomatic isolation because of the presence of the right-wing Freedom Party. The Freedom Party's leader, Joerg Haider, is not taking part in the cabinet, but as V-O-A's Ron Pemstein reports from Vienna, Mr. Haider's personality is the source of the controversy.

TEXT: "The Freedom Party is no Nazi party." Austrian President Thomas Klestil had to make the point bluntly in a statement to a Vienna magazine, to explain why he approved the coalition government between the right- wing Freedom Party and the conservative People's Party. In a democracy, Mr. Klestil says, a parliamentary majority must be respected. Personal feelings do not count. The reason for the president's concern is that Austria will be damaged internationally. The European Union, the United States and Israel have all threatened to punish Austria for including the Freedom Party in its coalition government. President Klestil made changes in the cabinet list submitted by Freedom Party leader Joerg Haider. He dropped two candidates for defense minister and finance minister. The men had helped to lead the Freedom Party into second place in last October's election, by playing on Austrian fears about foreign immigration and the dangers posed by enlargement of the European Union to countries in Central Europe. Mr. Haider -- who is not taking a personal role in the new government -- led the Freedom Party's campaign. He is returning to the southern province of Carinthia where he is the governor. It was in Carinthia where, 10 years ago, Mr. Haider began to make statements praising Nazi full-employment practices. A few years later he praised veterans of Hitler's Waffen S-S as " decent men of character." Melanie Sully has written a biography of Mr. Haider. She says his remarks praising Nazi policies are welcome in Carinthia.

[04] EU/AUSTRIA (L-ONLY) BY NICK SIMEONE (WASHINGTON)

INTRO: The European Union is defending its decision to impose political sanctions on Austria. Joerg Haider's efforts to distance himself from his most controversial comments praising aspects of Hitler's Germany have not dampened the controversy over his Freedom Party joining the new Austrian government. As Correspondent Nick Simeone reports, the 14 other members of the E-U are not yet prepared to take Haider at his word.

TEXT: E-U Commissioner Franz Fischler - himself an Austrian - says promises by Austria's new government for respect and tolerance are not enough. Unlike any government before it, this one, he said, will be judged by its actions. Words alone, are not enough. But that stand is drawing harsh reaction from some Austrians and others who think Europe is over reacting. John Richardson, deputy head of the E-U's mission in Washington is aware of it.

[05] U-S / AUSTRIA (L) BY KYLE KING (STATE DEPARTMENT)

INTRO: The United States is scaling back diplomatic contacts with Austria, in response to the swearing in of a new government that includes the far right Freedom Party of Joerg Haider. (The U-S action follows similar steps by European nations and Israel.) From the State Department, V-O-A's Kyle King reports.

TEXT: Secretary of State Madeleine Albright says she is deeply concerned that the anti-immigrant Freedom Party is now part of Austria's coalition government. Speaking to reporters following talks with the Spanish Foreign Minister, Ms. Albright said the United States will be watching the new government very closely.

[06] GERMANY SCANDAL BY JONATHAN BRAUDE (BERLIN)

INTRO: Germany's political opposition is in crisis. Day after day of new revelations destroy the reputations of Christian Democratic politicians at the state and at national level. And what makes it more shocking is that the apparent laundering of millions of dollars worth of illicit funds took place under the leadership of former Chancellor Helmut Kohl. The former Chancellor is the hero of German unification, who for most of his 17 years in office managed to maintain an air of political respectability and moral strength. Now all parties are looking at how to restore public trust in politics after scandals have tainted not only Mr. Kohl's Christian Democrats, or C-D-U, but some of the ruling Social Democratic Party, or S-P-D, as well. Jonathan Braude reports from Berlin.

TEXT: Last November, former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl confessed on television to maintaining secret party accounts to keep his Christian Democratic Union party in campaign funds. He took responsibility for accepting approximately 1 million U-S dollars from secret donors, but said he never pocketed the money himself. It had all been, he said, for the good of the party. He also said he had given his word of honor that he would never reveal the donors' names. ///Opt/// They were honorable men. But, said, Mr. Kohl, they did not wish their identity to be known. That, to him, justified running accounts that contradicted the strict letter of the law relating to party funds and acting outside the constitution. It also justified continuing his silence - even as it has since turned out, to the detriment of his party. ///end opt/// But by the time of Mr. Kohl's dramatic T-V confession, the C-D-U was in deep trouble. Unexplained funds running into millions of dollars dwarfed the amount he owned up to. And the affair grew worse. Statements by arms dealer Karl-Heinz Schreiber, a man the German authorities are trying to extradite from Canada to face charges of tax-evasion and bribery - had implicated not only Mr. Kohl but his former deputy, Wolfgang Schaeuble, now the party chairman. Mr. Schaeuble was soon forced to own up to receiving funds directly from Mr. Schreiber, and has since admitted he met the man more than once. Now even his version of how he received the money is being questioned by the woman he tried to blame, former party Treasurer Brigitte Baumeister.

[07] NORTHERN IRELAND (L-ONLY) BY LOURDES NAVARRO (LONDON)

INTRO: The British government has proposed legislation to suspend Northern Ireland's power- sharing government. Lourdes Navarro in London reports the proposal would not come into force until next week, giving the British and Irish governments crucial time to persuade the Irish Republican Army -- the I-R-A -- to disarm.

TEXT: Northern Ireland's power-sharing government was formed only nine weeks ago, and now it is very close to being suspended indefinitely. Britain's Northern Ireland Secretary, Peter Mandelson, presented a bill to parliament Friday giving him the power to take over direct control of the troubled province sometime this coming week. Whether this happens depends on whether the Irish Republican Army agrees to disarm in the near future. A disarmament commission reported this past Monday that the I-R-A had completely failed to begin handing in its weapons -- one of the requirements of Northern Ireland's 1998 peace accord. In response, Northern Ireland's largest Protestant party, the Ulster Unionists, said Britain also should suspend the new Northern Ireland legislature, on which they sit with the I-R-A's political wing, Sinn Fein. The Ulster Unionists say if that does not happen, Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble will resign as the assembly's leader. Leaders from Britain, the Irish Republic and the United States are frantically trying to prevent the suspension of the Northern Ireland government. The prime ministers of Britain and Ireland say the question of disarmament must be settled once and for all. President Clinton urged all the parties to work together to resolve the crisis, but he said he did not underestimate how difficult a resolution will be. Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams has called the proposed suspension disgraceful. He said it has already undermined his talks with the I-R-A, and would make disarmament even more difficult. The I-R-A has given little sign that it will hand over its cache of arms any time soon, although negotiators say there has been some progress. NEB/LN/JWH/ENE/WTW 04-Feb-2000 12:42 PM EDT (04-Feb-2000 1742 UTC)
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Source: Voice of America

[08] NY ECON WRAP (S&L) BY ELAINE JOHANSON (NEW YORK)

INTRO: U-S stock prices were mixed today (Friday), with late day profit taking erasing early gains. V-O- A correspondent Elaine Johanson reports from New York:

TEXT: The Dow Jones Industrial Average shed (lost) 49 points, less than one-half of one percent, closing at 10-thousand-963. The Industrials were up over 200 points for the week. The technology-weighted Nasdaq composite gained three-quarters of one percent, closing at a record high of 42-hundred-44. The Standard and Poor's 500 index dropped less than a point. Analysts say investors are focused on growth and technology, taking a more cautious approach toward the blue-chip stocks. Rising interest rates apparently are not a big problem for those fast-growing computer- related companies. The latest on the U-S economy shows unemployment in the United States dropping to a 30-year record low of four percent. Salaries grew only slightly more than expected in January. And U-S businesses created new jobs at the fastest pace in two years.

[09] AUSTRIA'S NEW GOVERNMENT BY ANDREW GUTHRIE (WASHINGTON)

INTRO: Editorial pages around the world this week are buzzing with reaction to the inclusion of a controversial right-wing party in the new Austrian coalition government. Joerg Haider's Freedom Party won 27-percent of the vote last October in the parliamentary elections, finishing second. Now, Mr. Haider's party has formed a coalition with the conservatives. The international community is protesting the new government because of Mr. Haidar's anti-immigration and anti- EU expansion policies and because he had made pro-Nazi remarks, for which he has since apologized. The European Union is freezing political ties with Austria - one of the bloc's own members and Israel has recalled its ambassador. We get a sampling of European editorial reaction to the developments from __________ in this week's World Opinion Roundup.

TEXT: Austria is facing a growing threat of international isolation this week, for defying world opinion and admitting the party of an apparent Nazi sympathizer to its new, coalition government. Months of negotiations between the conservative People's Party of Wolfgang Schuessel, which finished third, and the first place socialists, failed to produce an agreement on power-sharing in parliament. So, this week, the People's Party invited Mr. Haider's group to form a coalition government. Reaction has been swift, both diplomatically and in the world press. We begin our sampling in the extreme southeast of Austria, in the second largest city of Graz, near the Hungarian border, where the Kleine Zeitung is upset at the European reaction to Mr. Haider's party's participation in the new Austrian government.

VOICE: What is the state of Europe, that an intelligent provincial politician such as Joerg Haider can be perceived as a Europe-wide problem? And what is the state of a democracy that falls into panic and almost into agony when a party that is chosen by a quarter of the electorate is included in a new government? A Europe that plays disciplinarian of Austria is certainly not the Europe for which nearly 70- percent of Austrians voted in a referendum [on joining the E-U]. [EDITORS N O T E: BEGIN NEW MATERIAL HERE ]

TEXT: In Austria's capitol, Vienna, the Kurier is uneasy about the growing political confrontation with the rest of the world. Here's columnist Christoph Kotanko.

VOICE: The reactions from the European Union and the United States will have effects on us, even though the criticisms are wrong. The new government is in trouble. It is doubtful that this new government will be stable for the duration, as the federal president hopes ... It has built-in cracks. The Freedom Party ... ministers, even though they have good intentions, are new kids on the block. None of them has ever had responsibility on the federal or European level. /// OPT /// In addition, there is the foreign boycott, whose effects cannot yet be foreseen. /// END OPT ///

TEXT: Across town, Die Presse, runs this opinion pointing to what the paper feels is a hypocrisy on the European Union's part.

VOICE: Critical leaders of individual European countries, especially France, Belgium, and Italy, are using the Austrian situation to advance their own domestic political agendas. What is needed is composure, trust, and vigilance. We don't need hyper reactions from abroad or from groups within Austria. Nor do we need snotty counter-reactions against all foreign criticism, even though some of it is justified. ... This strange argumentation [by the European Union] points to a contradiction ... that has hitherto never appeared so blatantly as at ... present. ... the contradiction between the democratically constituted E-U states and the lack of democracy in the E-U itself, that becomes ever more evident, the more the E-U acts as a unit. [EDITORS: THIS E N D S THE NEW, MATERIAL]

TEXT: Meanwhile, in neighboring Germany, The Frankfurter Rundschau in the nation's financial capital notes:

VOICE: The E-U threats to impose sanctions ... also serve [to strengthen the E-U's] credibility toward E-U accession candidates in Austria's neighborhood ... Irrespective of whether it is the Slovak Republic, the Czech Republic, or Hungary, pluralist democracies in the region ten years after the collapse of communism are not very fashionable right now. Austria's serving as a central European model for a failure to transform from authoritarian-bureaucratic structures to a civil society would really be a disaster for the continent.

TEXT: In another German city, Ludwigshafen, Die Rheinpfalz laments:

VOICE: The partially self-righteous appeals to the Austrians to stop ... this course will have the opposite of the intended effect. ... even the most well-intentioned advice is revealing a deep ignorance about the political situation in the country ...

TEXT: To the south now, and an Italian reaction from the former Italian ambassador to Washington Boris Biancheri, writing in Turin's La Stampa:

VOICE: There is something puzzling in this sudden outburst of European decisiveness, in this unexpected common approach by the E-U ... It would have been better to wait for the program of the new Austrian government and, based on facts rather than assumptions, take the necessary steps.

TEXT: In Rome, La Repubblica sees an even deeper significance in the European Union's action.

VOICE: Perhaps European leaders are not fully aware of this ... but they have made a truly constitutional gesture in a Europe that still fools itself that it can live without a charter of its own. ... the declaration of the 14 E-U nations lays the political and geo-political bases for a European state.

TEXT: In Russia, along the same line of thinking as Le Repubblica, there is some surprise in this comment from Moscow's Noviye Izvestiya:

VOICE: It is the first case of European leaders deciding ... they can interfere in the strictly internal affairs of a sovereign state.

TEXT: Now a pair of widely disparate views. First from Brussels, Belgium's De Financieel-Economische Tijd suggests:

VOICE: The E-U cannot stand idly and watch what is happening in Austria. The values of mutual respect, democracy and human rights are too deeply burnt in the soul of the Union to tamper with them.

TEXT: Taking a very different stance is Denmark's big Copenhagen daily, Berlingske Tidende:

VOICE: The E-U's threats to freeze out Austria if it forms a conservative-Freedom Party coalition are unfair, unwise and dishonest. ... The action also raises the question: Should the E-U express its approval every time a country changes government?

TEXT: However in the Netherlands, there is no support for the new Austrian government. In Haagsche Courant, from The Hague, home of the World Court, we read:

VOICE: Within Europe there is no place for [Mr. Haider's] ideas which are reminiscent of one of the most horrible episodes of the 20th century. It is therefore good that the E-U has reacted strongly to the Austrian political developments.

TEXT: In Spain, La Vanguardia in Barcelona is puzzled about the internal, as well as the external criticism and notes:

VOICE: Opposition to the inclusion of [Mr.] Haider's party ... has been made forcefully clear not only by the E-U and [the] United States, but [also by] [Austrian President Thomas] Klestil himself. In a newspaper interview he noted that ` all the prominent officers of [Mr.] Haider's] party today still use language that disqualifies them from holding public office. ` If this is the opinion of the president who must give his assent to admitting the extreme right into the government, it would be difficult to imagine any harsher criticism coming from an external source.

TEXT: And in Europe's far southeast, Turkey's Cumhuriyet from Istanbul is impressed by the far- reaching potential impact of this situation.

VOICE: The Austrian case will be a learning experience that will help define human rights and democracy in the 21st century.

TEXT: On that note, we conclude this sampling of the European press on the Austrian political situation. NEB/ANG/gm/JO 04-Feb-2000 11:27 AM EDT (04-Feb-2000 1627 UTC)
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Source: Voice of America

[10] FRIDAY'S EDITORIALS BY ANDREW GUTHRIE (WASHINGTON)

INTRO: The inclusion of a Nazi sympathizer in the new Austrian coalition government continues to draw attention in the U-S press. The big domestic story drawing comment (today/Friday) is the moratorium on state death sentences in Illinois, where at least a dozen prisoners on death-row have been freed, due to failings in the justice system. Other topics under discussion include the new crisis involving the Irish Republican Army and Northern Ireland's peace process; a government-versus-military standoff in Indonesia; and renewed tensions in the Horn of Africa. Now, here is _________ with a closer look and some excerpts in today's Editorial Digest.

TEXT: Austria's president has formally accepted a coalition government including the far-right Freedom Party of Joerg Haider, as editorial writers in the United States continue to discuss the situation. U-S-A Today, the national daily published in the Washington area, headlines its story about Austria, "Sounds of the Third Reich."

VOICE: In "The Sound of Music," trouble comes to the singing Von Trapps after the German takeover of Austria: It's Hitler's imported storm troopers who force their way in and chase the plucky family as it flees into exile. The reality was much uglier. Missions of Captain Von Trapp's fellow Austrians welcomed Nazism in 1938, and enthusiastically joined the deadly crusade. ... That conveniently airbrushed history echoes disturbingly today in the baroque palaces of Vienna. For the first time in 55 years, a government has come to power in Europe built around an ultranationalist and xenophobic party that has played to echoes of the Nazi era. ... The United States murmurs concern. But the World War Two victors share responsibility for Austria's amnesia.

TEXT: The Detroit News, on the other hand, worries that ostracism of Austria by the European Union and the United States will only make matters worse.

VOICE: The horrors of Nazism still bulk large in Western memory, and rightly so. But Austria's friends should be careful not to make matters worse by oversimplifying what's going on. Joerg Haider ... has made comments in the past that raise legitimate questions about his motives. ... [However] Mr. Haider has since apologized for those comments. And this week he and his coalition partners issued what would appear to be a forthright statement renouncing Austria's Nazi past. It would seem a bit of a stretch to view Mr. Haider as a potential Hitler of Austria. // OPT // ... One of his major campaign pledges -- to end payment of welfare to immigrants -- may have touched a real nerve among the citizens who pay the taxes. It's worth remembering that the voters of California did exactly the same thing, by a wide margin, in a recent referendum...

TEXT: The New York Times however, is uneasy, titling its commentary, "An Unwelcome Austrian Government." The Times suggests:

VOICE: The appropriate reaction is to cool relations with Austria, which is what the European Union, the United States and Israel seem prepared to do. The Austrian people have a right to vote for whatever parties they choose. ... But Austria's neighbors and friends are not obliged to conduct business as usual with a government that will now include ... Joerg Haider,[a man who] has expressed admiration for Nazi labor policies and praised ... the murderous Waffen SS. // END OPT //

TEXT: Domestically, the major issue drawing comment is this week's decision by the governor of the (Midwestern) state of Illinois, George Ryan, to suspend all executions until the state's criminal- justice system can be thoroughly investigated. At least a dozen convicted murderers sentenced to die have been released in the past few years, after faulty prosecutions or trials were uncovered. In neighboring Wisconsin, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel welcomes the news.

VOICE: In heeding his conscience, the Republican [Governor, Mr.] Ryan set an example that governors of other death-penalty states should follow. ... Still, there's just one way to rule out altogether the possibility that an innocent person will be sentenced to die: by sentencing nobody to die.

TEXT: In northern New Jersey, The [Bergen County] Record calls the governor's action "a principled step." The Atlanta Constitution considers it "a courageous decision," while in Boston, the (nationally-distributed) Christian Science Monitor ponders the death penalty's future in light of this latest action.

VOICE: ... Can we reliably exclude human error, including prosecutorial excess, from the justice system? And if such errors are surfacing too often in Illinois, how free of them are the other 37 states with the death penalty? // OPT

TEXT: Today's Chicago Tribune is upset at the prospect of more fighting on the "Horn of Africa" between two nations that it feels have better uses for their treasuries.

VOICE: The simmering border war between Ethiopia and Eritrea is poised to erupt again in bloodshed and agony for the people of those troubled nations. ... Despite the best efforts of the Clinton administration to negotiate a peace, some 250-thousand troops have been assembled on each side of the disputed border, ready to resume a conflict that killed more than 70-thousand people in 1998 and 1999. ... Tragically, there appears to be little, if anything, the U-S or other outsiders can do to stop it.

TEXT: On that note, we conclude this sampling of opinion from the editorial columns of Friday's U-S press.
NEB/ANG/WTW 04-Feb-2000 12:27 PM EDT (04-Feb-2000 1727 UTC)
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Source: Voice of America

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