Yugoslav Daily Survey
BELGRADE, 22 June 2000
C O N T E N T S :
FROM THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA
-YUGOSLAV FOREIGN MINISTER RECEIVES
DIENSTBIER
-KORAC RECEIVES DIENSTBIER
-MINISTER MATIC URGES URGENT ADOPTION OF LAW
AGAINST TERRORISM
YUGOSLAVIA - IRAQ
-IRAQI OFFICIAL ACCEPTS YUGOSLAV AMBASSADOR'S
CREDENTIALS
SERBIAN PROVINCE OF KOSOVO AND METOHIJA
-US POLICEMEN PROVOKE INCIDENT IN UN-RULED
KOSOVSKA MITROVICA
-TWO SERB WOMEN INJURED IN BOMB BLAST IN
KOSOVO AND METOHIJA
KOSOVO AND METOHIJA - INTERNATIONAL REACTIONS
-UN KOSOVO-METOHIJA MISSION FALLS DOWN ON
THE JOB - DIENSTBIER
NATO AGGRESSION - INTERNATIONAL REACTIONS
-RUSSIAN BELGRADE CORRESPONDENTS AWARDED
ORDERS OF COURAGE
* * *
FROM THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA
YUGOSLAV FOREIGN MINISTER RECEIVES
DIENSTBIER
BELGRADE, June 22 (Tanjug) - Yugoslav Foreign Minister Zivadin
Jovanovic received U.N. special rapporteur on human rights Jiri
Dienstbier here Wednesday.
During the talks, the sides most strongly condemned the continuing
terrorism of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) in Serbia's
Kosovo and Metohija province, the ethnic cleansing of Serbs,
and massive
human rights violations, a ministry statement said.
It was demanded that an end be put to deluding the world public
and that
the failure of the United Nations mission comprising UNMIK and KFOR
is admitted. Since their very deployment, UNMIK and KFOR have been
working on protecting the terrorist KLA, crime and the drug
mafia, and
not on protecting the population - which is their primary task
under the
relevant U.N. Security Council decision, the statement said.
Any attempts,
under the guise of concern for human rights, freedom of the
press, or
democracy, by anyone to interfere in the internal affairs of
Yugoslavia, as
an independent and sovereign state, were resolutely rejected.
Sanctions were most sharply condemned as the most massive form of
violation of the elementary human rights. It was demanded that
all those
who sincerely care about humanism should prove this by abolishing
sanctions, the statement said.
KORAC RECEIVES DIENSTBIER
BELGRADE, June 21 (Tanjug) - Yugoslav government Commission for
Humanitarian Issues and Missing Persons President Maksim Korac on
Tuesday received U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Croatia,
Bosnia-Herzegovina and Yugoslavia Jiri Dienstbier and discussed with
him the problem of missing persons in the territory of former
Yugoslavia.
Korac presented problems in cooperation so far between the Yugoslav
commission and the Croatian Commission for Captured and Missing, and
indicated it was necessary that the international community
make an effort
for the Croatian side to respect the obligations undertaken
through the
Agreement on cooperation between Yugoslavia and Croatia in seeking
missing persons, said a statement by the federal Information
Ministry.
Due to obstruction from the Croatian side, the main principle of the
Agreement has not been realized, that the fates of over 3,000
missing
persons on Yugoslavia's list be determined without
preconditions and in
keeping with the norms of international humanitarian law, Korac
said.
"The agreed meeting, which was to have taken place in Zagreb in
early
March 1999, was not set," Korac said, explaining that Croatia
was trying
to make it appear, by breaking off cooperation, that Yugoslavia
does not
wish to resolve humanitarian issues.
Korac said there were still 77 Serbs in Croatian prisons. Of
these, 66 have
already been indicted or legally condemned for war crimes, even
though
all prisoners claim their trials had been staged and based on false
testimonies, he said.
In February 1999, Croatia reneged on an agreement between the
Yugoslav
and Croatian foreign ministers to exchange prisoners according
to the
principle "all for all."
Korac said he expected that Dienstbier would use his authority
with the
United Nations to secure that Croatia continues to act in
keeping with the
Agreement on cooperation in seeking missing persons, and that
cooperation also be established in this area with
representatives of the
federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the ministry statement said.
MINISTER MATIC URGES URGENT ADOPTION OF LAW
AGAINST TERRORISM
BELGRADE, June 22 (Tanjug) - Yugoslav Information Minister Goran
Matic said on Wednesday that the national legal system was
passive and
that it was necessary urgently to adopt a law on fighting
terrorism. In a
statement to YU-INFO TV, Matic said it was impermissible that
after the
discovery and world-wide broadcasting of footage on the
involvement of
three representatives of the United States administration -
Sean Burns,
James Sweigert and Gabriel Escobar, as well as USAID Podgorica
program assistant Nebojsa Cagorovic, in the recent assassination of
Montenegrin National Security Adviser Goran Zugic, that the
federal state
prosecutor had not demanded their apprehension and that
Yugoslavia had
not asked Interpol to have these persons extradited.
"Our legislature and prosecutor's office must be given
incentive to react in
such developments, because they have a legal basis already at
this time,"
Matic said.
Speaking about the stand of western media and their reports
about the
terrorist group Spider which was arrested in Yugoslavia last autumn,
Matic said this was given considerable coverage, in particular
the plan to
assassinate Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.
"The replacement of key figures in the French intelligence
service is
conclusive proof that our claims were correct," he said.
Just two hours after the press conference at which he spoke
about the
involvement of the CIA in Zugic's assassination, Matic said he had
received information that leading western media were trying to
prevent the
spreading of the story about the participation of the Washington
administration in this crime.
"In our papers as well, an entire network of people and
reporters were
activated to boost the CIA and compromise the sources of this
report in a
specific way," Matic said.
YUGOSLAVIA - IRAQ
IRAQI OFFICIAL ACCEPTS YUGOSLAV AMBASSADOR'S
CREDENTIALS
BAGHDAD, June 21 (Tanjug) - On behalf of Iraqi President Saddam
Hussain, Vice Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council Izzat
Ibrahim Al-Duri accepted on Wednesday the credentials of
Yugoslavia's
new ambassador in Baghdad Enes Karabegovic.
Presenting the credentials, Karabegovic said he was determined
to work
for further promoting bilateral relations in line with Yugoslav
President
Slobodan Milosevic's instructions about the need to consolidate
all-round
cooperation with friendly Iraq.
He stressed it was a happy circumstance that the positions of
the Yugoslav
side are reciprocated by the relevant instructions of President
Saddam
Hussain.
Accepting the credentials, Ibrahim Al-Duri said that Karabegovic was
assuming office at a very important time when bilateral
relations are in the
ascendant.
This is in the best interests of the peoples of Yugoslavia and
Iraq, as well
as an example to all freedom-loving forces in the world that
the common
hegemonistic enemy, embodied in the United States, can be
resisted, he
said.
SERBIAN PROVINCE OF KOSOVO AND METOHIJA
US POLICEMEN PROVOKE INCIDENT IN UN-RULED
KOSOVSKA MITROVICA
KOSOVSKA MITROVICA, Serbia, June 21 (Tanjug) - American UN
policemen on Wednesday escorted a water tanker with UNHCR markings
into the Serb part of ethnically divided Kosovska Mitrovica
which carried
a concealed ethnic Albanian instead of water.
The attempted infiltration into the Serb part of the
UN-administered city
provoked an incident in which 19 Serbs, including a child, were
injured.
The Serbs spotted the ethnic Albanian in the water tanker and
came out
into the streets to protest.
The US police officers fired several shots on a group of Serbs
and sprayed
them with tear-gas, wounding Branko Bascarevic and a boy, Boban
Nedeljkovic, while other Serbs and to have hospital treatment
for their
injuries in the incident.
TWO SERB WOMEN INJURED IN BOMB BLAST IN
KOSOVO AND METOHIJA
GNJILANE, June 22 (Tanjug) - Two Serb women were injured in
Gnjilane, eastern Kosovo and Metohija province, late Wednesday when
ethnic Albanian extremists threw a hand grenade at their house.
Vukosava Ivkovic, 78, received stomach wounds, while she was sitting
on the porch of a building located about 10 meters from the
site of the
blast. Her daughter Olivera Ivkovic, 42, was wounded when the bomb,
hurled from the street over the fence, exploded behind her.
KFOR military doctors treated the Serb women.
Eight men were watching the Yugoslavia-Spain match at the European
soccer championships on TV at Tomislav Ivkovic's house. Their loud
cheering every time the Yugoslav team scored irritated ethnic
Albanian
extremists who were passing along the street, and, ultimately,
they hurled
a bomb at the house.
The room where the men had been watching TV was completely
demolished, all windows shattered, and the ceiling was riddled
with shell
fragments. A deep crater was formed in the yard.
Material damage is substantial. Three nearby houses were also
damaged in
the blast.
U.N. civilian mission UNMIK members unofficially concluded that the
attack was also in connection with efforts by ethnic Albanians
to intimidate
the Ivkovic family and force them to sell their house at a
lower price.
KOSOVO AND METOHIJA - INTERNATIONAL REACTIONS
UN KOSOVO-METOHIJA MISSION FALLS DOWN ON THE
JOB - DIENSTBIER
BELGRADE, June 21 (Tanjug) - The UN mission to Kosovo-Metohija
has fallen down on the job, according to the special UN human rights
rapporteur for Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Yugoslavia on
Wednesday.
Jiri Dienstbier said that, through mistakes of the
international community,
the UN mission to that province of the Yugoslav republic of
Serbia has
been unable to attain the targets set by UN Security Council
Resolution
1244.
The question of Kosovo is highly specific and it must not be
accepted that
the result of the international operation in Kosovo should be
its ethnic
cleansing of its non-Albanians, Dienstbier told a news
conference at the
close of a three-day visit to Yugoslavia.
In answer to reporters' questions, he said that international
organisations
have the obligation to make possible the repatriation of all
those who wish
to return to their homes, and spoke out against ethnic
cleansing in any
shape or form.
NATO AGGRESSION - INTERNATIONAL REACTIONS
RUSSIAN BELGRADE CORRESPONDENTS AWARDED
ORDERS OF COURAGE
BELGRADE, June 22 (Tanjug) - Russian Ambassador to Yugoslavia
Valery Yegoshkin presented here Wednesday the Orders of Courage to
Itar-Tass reporters Tamara Zamyatina and Nikolai Kalintsev, who
reported
about the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia last year.
The awards were presented to the reporters "for courage and
selflessness
displayed in carrying out their professional duties," as
Russian President
Vladimir Putin said in his decree.
Yegoshkin said the work of the awarded reporters was of high
quality and
professionalism even in the most dangerous times.
The voice of the Russian reporters was heard in the whole
world, not only
in Russia, the ambassador said.
Thanks to their efforts, Ambassador Yegoshkin said, the world
received
complete and unbiased information on what was happening in
Yugoslavia
at that time.
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