OHR BiH Media Round-up, 18/11/2002

Headlines in Print Media

Oslobodjenje: UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in Sarajevo – Law and justice are key for BiH

Dnevni Avaz: Minister Ramiz Mehmedagic claims – There will be no Law on restitution

Dnevni List: UN Secretary General unveils monument to fallen members of UN in Sarajevo: Lost lives in service of peace

Vecernji List: Mijo Anic, Federation Defence Minister, asks Ashdown’s help: General threatening Ministry of Defence

Slobodna Dalmacija: Testimonies against Croatian generals collected in Banja Luka

Glas Srpski: The US Deputy State Secretary John Bolton confesses – US scared by the Court; Banja Luka – Checks thinner because of calculations

Nezavisne Novine: Kofi Annan in two-day visit to BiH – UN to protect future generations from horrors of war; After the incident in Banja Luka Electric-Technical High School – an F may be a motive for attack against professors

Blic: Banja Luka’s Clinical Centre without medical supplies; Srebrenica’s Bosniaks uncomfortable with church; Dejan Miletic: A year without reply from the Hague; Male minor’s body in pieces and a lot of explosive found

UN Secretary General arrives in Sarajevo; Ashdown on UN achievements in BiH

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan arrived in BiH on Sunday on a two-day official visit. At Sarajevo airport, he was greeted by the chairman of the BiH Presidency, Mirko Sarovic, the chairman of the BiH Council of Ministers, Dragan Mikerevic and the Head of the UN Mission to BiH, Jacques Paul Klein. In the course of the day, Annan unveiled a plaque in front of the UN mission building in Sarajevo, which – as it was said – commemorates all UN staff who were killed during the war in former Yugoslavia. Annan said that this was how we commemorate all those who were killed, but also those who suffered, particularly in the unprotected Srebrenica. The plaque will, as he put it, reinforce UN resolve to fight for human rights and peace throughout the world. While paying tribute to peace-keepers, head of the UN mission in BiH, Jacques Paul Klein said that this was done for justice and peace. Sarovic for his part welcomed the UN secretary general, saying that this was encouragement to all of us in BiH to persevere on our European path and work towards the consolidation of peace. On Monday, the UN Secretary General is scheduled to meet members of the BiH Presidency members and hold talks with members of the BiH Council of Ministers, RS Prime Minister, Mladen Ivanic and his Federation counterpart, Alija Behmen. (Oslobodjenje, front page, p 3: “Law and justice are keys for BiH”, Dnevni Avaz, p 9, mentioned on the front page: “We remember pain of the people of this city”, Vjesnik, p 2, Jutarnji List, p 2, Slobodna Dalmacija, last page, Dnevni List , front and p 3, Vecernji List, front and p 51, Glas Srpski, p 3, Nezavisne Novine, p 2, Blic p 2)

The High Representative, Paddy Ashdown, stated in an interview for BBC Radio that the UN Mission to BiH had achieved great success in the country when it comes to the return of refugees and establishment of the police forces (Nezavisne Novine, p 2). The daily quotes Ashdown as saying: “When members of this mission leave the country on January 1 next year, they will leave behind maybe the best police force in the Balkans.” Ashdown also commented on frequent statements about BiH, being the center of human trafficking and organized crime: “We should remember that organized crime, corruption and black market follow all wars, as dark and inevitable consequences. Those who remember Europe after the WW II, also remember that in 1951, Europe was overwhelmed with crime, corruption and black market and that we had to stop it. We have to do the same here.”

Federation affairs

While summing up the work of the BiH Federation Ministry of Urban Planning and Environment, Minister Ramiz Mehmedagic said that it was necessary to pass the state Law on the Restitution as soon as possible in order to lift bans in some laws that were slowing down the process of privatization. However, with regard to this issue, Mehmedagic is skeptical. “I think that the BiH Law on the Restitution will never be adopted, and this is not my opinion, but this can be hinted from the international community’s position on the issue. When I insisted that the law is adopted at the state level, the international officials said that ther was a need for such law, but that there were no funds to cover it at the moment,” he emphasized (FENA, Oslobodjenje, p 6, Dnevni Avaz, front page, p 3: “There will be no law on restitution”)

Vecernji List (front and page 3, by Zoran Kresic) reads that the Federation Defence Minister, Mijo Anic, sent a letter to the High Representative for BiH, Paddy Ashdown, in which he asked the HR not to allow the return of senior military officers who were loyal to the “Croat self-rule” project and to prevent the purge against the people who remained loyal to him (Anic) two years ago. According to VL, Anic requests that some 45 officers and former employees of the Federation MoD be publicly labeled and in that context the daily says that the list of persons sent by Anic contains all assistants and associates of a former Federation Defence Minister Miroslav Prce as well as names of 14 HVO generals. Anic’s letter also reads that general John Sylvester suspended a big group of officers of the Croat component for siding with the Croat self-rule adding that the names and number of the suspended remained a secret.

A separate article in the same papers on page 2 by Z. Jurilj carries Minister Anic who confirms that he has sent the letter to the OHR because of the open threats by some Croat commanders against people from the Federation MoD and Army who were not loyal to the “self-rule”. “Unseen pressures and threats by former senior commanders who sided with the Croat self-rule, have gone so far that there are open messages that nobody will keep a job in the MoD of Federation Army after they have returned”, says Anic. According to Jurilj, the OHR requested Minister Anic to provide a list of all commanders who were loyal to the self-rule and a list of people who were suspended from the Federation Army. Finally, the author concludes that there will be a meeting at OHR Sarajevo about the issue.

Vecernji List (front and page 3, by Zdenko Jurilj) carries that this daily received a letter from Croat prisoners in the Zenica Correctional Institution in which the Croat prisoners describe details of the national and religious discriminations they are exposed to. The letter also says that the management of the prison has a benevolent attitude towards the tortures and the management does not punish perpetrators in a proper way. The letter adds that they informed all institutions in BiH about their position, including the OHR, and for this reason it is not clear to them as to how none has reacted officially against it. The letter concludes: “We have summoned up courage to inform the public about our position also through newspapers no matter as to what will happen to us afterwards.”

Dnevni List (front and page 5, by V. Maric) carries that close to the apartment in which Jozo Leutar, the late Federation Deputy Minister of Interior lived, a telephone booth full of evidence mysteriously disappeared. DL says that the defense of six persons, who were charged with the Leutar murder, has sent many official letters to the BiH Post Office demanding an explanation as to why a disputable telephone booth was removed and at whose order. According to analysts, the explosive device could have been activated from this booth. The article says that even now none from the BiH Post Office declared itself on this issue, and the BiH Post Office did not confirm that someone of their officials removed the booth. DL says that according to the order of the leadership of the Ministry of Interior of the Sarajevo Canton at that time, every possible evidence about the assassination was removed, even some of the photographs and materials/ that journalists recorded after the assassination.

Vecernji List (page 4, by Friar Ivo Skoko) carries an editorial on this issue. The editorial says that the high-ranked officials from various institutions were involved in this staged process, however, they did not manage to control all media referring to the fact that VL published a photo false protected witness. The editorial says: “It is not possible to create a healthy society without professional journalism. With the development of the professional journalism, justice and all other values in the society will also strengthen.”

Vecernji List (page 51, by Zdenko Jurilj) carries that about 70 former employees of SNS (a former Croat Intelligence Service) and about 100 former employees of AID (a former Bosniak Intelligence Service), who lost job after merging of these two Services in the Federation Intelligence Service (FOSS) demand that a working body of the BiH Federation Parliament makes a complete revision of the way in which some people were employed in FOSS. They believe that they were dismissed illegally, due to the political reasons.  VL says that they are also going to inform OHR and Ombudsman’s Office about this issue. VL also says that the Alliance for Changes wants to preserve the current structure of FOSS while national parties want to see their people in FOSS. The editorial concludes: “It seems that even Paddy Ashdown, an absolute political authority,  will not be able to stop a silent political-intelligence war that stared before the general elections.”

Petritsch: EU must better understand the Balkans

The former High Representative of the international community in BiH, Wolfgang Petritsch, said on Sunday at an Austrian Social-Democratic Party’s conference in Vienna that the European Union in the future would have to show better understanding and pay more attention to the southeast Europe, since the countries from the region would be candidates in the next circle of its enlargement. The leader of the RS Party of Independent Social-Democrats (SNSD), Milorad Dodik, who participated at the conference, said that the citizens of the countries in the southeast Europe including BiH wanted to join Europe. (Oslobodjenje, p 6, Dnevni Avaz, p 2)

Dnevni List (p 10) quotes Dodik as saying that the EU must not be selective during the process of joining the Southeast Europe countries to the EU. “BiH cannot join the EU without Serbia and Croatia”, said Dodik adding that a regional co-operation of countries of former Yugoslavia is important.

Post election developments

Dnevni List (page 7, by Zoran Vidic) reads that the first moves by newly elected members of the BiH Presidency, Mirko Sarovic, Sulejman Tihic and Dragan Covic, who according to the author advocate for separation of the BiH Presidency’s Secretariat into three parts, show that the troika are not devoted to the declared reforms thus confirming Clifford Bond’s stance about SDS, SDA and HDZ. Vidic goes on to say that the national parties failed at their first test and the High Representative for BiH, Paddy Ashdown, who was according to the media willing to give a chance to national parties, is starting to change his opinion about the national parties. Ashdown allegedly advocated for the coexistence of the national and moderate parties in order to create a stable parliamentary majority which would help the reforms and help democratization of SDS, SDA and HDZ. In that context, Vidic notes that Ashdown’s projections were premature and that national parties have shown that they are not ready to run the country towards European direction. The author says that the IC again starts to realize that the national troika has to be put on hold until they have reformed within themselves and deserved another chance to lead the country. Vidic substantiates his claims by citing the HR Ashdown who recently said that Ambassador Bond had a right to be skeptical about the nationalists being ready to carry out reforms. “This clearly shows the Ashdown’s diversion from the course of giving nationalists a chance, something that he, if not openly, at least tacitly advocated”, says Vidic. The author concludes the article by saying that Ambassador Bond was right about the national parties and that Ashdown has, without a doubt, joined Bond’s stance about the national parties.

Vecernji List (front and page 5, conducted by Robert Bubalo) carries an interview with Rifet Dolic, the Vice President of DNZ, who says that they have received an information saying that money for the terrorist action in Karlovac is being collected these days in the Una-Sana Canton and that the supporters of Fikret Abdic would be accused of this act. Dolic added that they would give these information to the BiH and Croatian Police. With regard to the talks that Fikret Abdic, the President of DNZ, had with The Hague investigators, Dolic says that the investigators reiterated that The Hague is not interested in issuing of a bill of indictment against Abdic. Dolic also said that Croatian President Stjepan Mesic is involved in the process against Abdic and that Mesic did it in order to compensate his debt towards SDA, which considerably helped Mesic’s campaign. According to Dolic, it was agreed between Mesic and Izetbegovic to keep Abdic in prison, while concrete details were agreed by Zlatko Lagumdzija and Sulejman Tihic in Mesic’s residence.

Dnevni List (page 10) carries the leader of SNSD, Milorad Dodik, as saying in Vienna that the next two weeks, when a new parliamentary majority should be known, are crucial for creation of a new RS Government. “Talks were held with a big number of parties. At this moment, we are closest to a concept of forming the RS Government led by SNSD”, said Dodik adding that the success requires closing down talks with the President of PDP Mladen Ivanic. Dodik goes on to say that Ivanic needs to be supported in his wish to become the BiH Minister of Foreign Affairs. “The difference between us is that Ivanic thinks that he ought and can be the Foreign Minister but also believes that the RS Prime Minister should be a member of his party which is debatable”, says Dodik. (Nezavisne Novine, p 5)

Political parties on the reform of BiH Council of Ministers

The views of the BiH political parties related to the reform of the BiH Council of Ministers are different: parties from the RS do not share the views of the parties from the BiH Federation that the Council should be developed into a BiH government with more ministries and without rotation principle at the post of the chairman (Nezavisne Novine, p 4). The SANSDS and SDS have the same opinion on the issue: there is no equality without the rotation principle. They just suggested that the mandate of the Council of Ministers Chairman is extended to 16 month or two years (at the moment it is 6 months). An SDS representative, Momir Tosic, stated that OHR suggested that Ministry for European Integration is under direct control of the CoM Chairman: “We think that Ministries should not expand due to the limited budget.” Tosic also stated that SDS is against the change of name of BiH CoM into BiH Government. An SNSD representative, Nebojsa Radmanovic, stated that discussion on CoM should focus on the efficiency of its work, not on its name. The daily quotes Radmanovic as saying: “The CoM should remain what it is. However, steps should be undertaken to make its work more efficient.”     

• Kofi Annan inaugurates monument dedicated to the UN members
• Deadline for Serbian president candidacy expires at midnight
• American aircrafts bombed Iraqi anti-aircraft defense

FTV 1 (1930)

• UN Secretary General Kofi Annan arrived today in Sarajevo
• 15-year old boy killed by the explosive device in Bjeljina
• New, insulting graphite against returnees into Podrinje

RTRS (1930)

• UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in Sarajevo
• Fifteen-year old boy died in the mine explosion near Brcko
• Governance engine spends too much money, claims the World Bank Director for BiH