Visit our website: HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --------------------------------------------- http://www.ekathimerini.com/news/content.asp?id=95813 KATHIMERINI ATHENS, TUESDAY, AUGUST 14, 2001 Shaky future for Kosovo metals By Fredrik Dahl Reuters PRISTINA - Kosovo's once-mighty Trepca mining and smelting complex will have a future only if rival claims on it are dropped for the present, a senior official of the province's UN-led administration said. Tim O'Neill, co-head of Kosovo's Department of Trade and Industry, said that otherwise it would be impossible to attract private investors to the run-down zinc, lead and silver producer which was a major employer in the old, socialist Yugoslavia. "If we were to liquidate Trepca in a bankruptcy proceeding today there would be no money for any of the claimants, neither the ownership claims nor the debt claims," he told Reuters. "If the claims are not dropped there is no future for Trepca," he said, adding that a Belgrade-registered company says it owns Trepca's assets but this is not recognized by the Albanian majority in Kosovo. In addition, debt demands on the now UN-administered zinc and lead-based complex amount to well over $100 million. O'Neill said Trepca, which once employed up to 40,000 people and operated 40 major installations in Kosovo and elsewhere in Yugoslavia, had a "very limited potential viability," based on the most recent analysis which was still incomplete. He said nowadays there was no production at all at Trepca, the facilities of which lie on both sides of Kosovo's ethnic divide, but his office had developed 10 potentially viable business concepts for which private investors would be sought. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Make international calls for as low as $.04/minute with Yahoo! Messenger http://phonecard.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------------------------- This Discussion List is the follow-up for the old stopnato @listbot.com that has been shut down ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9spWA Or send an email To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This email was sent to: [email protected] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
