4 October 2002 Morning Edition

Kosovo Stories

· NATO Backs UN envoy's plan for tense Kosovo town (AFP)
· UN digs up remains of 28 more bodies in Kosovo (AFP)
· Another 28 bodies exhumed in Kosovo (B92)
· Covic and Steiner race to woo Serbs (FoNet)
· Kosovo Serbs dismiss UN plan for Mitrovica as "political marketing trick" (BBC)
· UN Chief in Kosovo Pleased with Belgrade's acceptance of plan (BBC)
· Largest Serbian Diaspora group to meet in USA, discuss Kosovo, Bosnia…(BBC)
· UNMIK forensic experts find remains of 35 bodies near Djakovica (BBC)
· Kosovo Serb bloc seeks sacking of premier…(BBC)
· Serbian Officials: Belgrade just coordinating final decision by Kosovo Serbs (BBC)
· Serbian Official says Belgrade stands for Unified Kosovo (BBC)
· Leader (BBC & Scotsman)
· Serbia deputy premier deems UN plan for Mitrovica "interesting" (BBC)
· Multiethnic police discover large cache of weapons in south Serbia (BBC)
· Austria evicts asylum seekers, sends Kosovans back to Prishtina (AFP)

Regional News

Macedonia

· Macedonia's new parliament reconvenes after opposition election (AFP)
· Kwasniewski support Macedonian candidature for NATO and European Union (DPA)
· Macedonia's first parliament elected since last year's insurgency (AP)
· New Macedonian parliament begins work (DPA)
· Macedonia ex-rebels take seats in Parliament (Reuters)

Serbia

· Failure to elect Serbian president would bring instability (AP)
· Serbian ultra nationalist calls for boycott of presidential (AFP)
· Nationalist boycott call may wreck Serbian vote (Reuters)
· U.S. writes off part of Yugoslav debt (AP)

Bosnia

· Bosnia election rallies pit fear against hope (Reuters)
· U.S. hopes to make example of Bosnian Serb leader's guilty plea… (AP)
· Plavsic's guilty plea to have no consequences for Bosnian Serb (AFP)
· Karadzic ally wanted cash from Belgrade-prosecutors (Reuters)

Milosevic Indictment

· Milosevic trial shifts down a gear, indiscreet lawyer (AFP)
· Lawyer in Milosevic's trial defends his job after scandal over (AP)

The Hague - ICC

· War Crime trial considers making reports testify (Reuters)

NATO & EU

· EUROPE: NATO set to form 'go anywhere, any time force' (F.T)
· EU defense Ministers meet under pressure to modernize military (AP)
· Iraq crises looms over EU defense minister's talks on… (AP)

Special Reports - Commentaries

· Blair and America's wars (Guardian)
· Nobel Peace Prize winner selected - but mum's the word (AFP)

NATO backs UN envoy's plan for tense Kosovo town

BRUSSELS, Oct 3 (AFP) - NATO chief George Robertson Thursday threw his "full support" behind a plan by the top United Nations official in Kosovo to ease tensions in the ethnically divided town of Kosovska Mitrovica.

The plan by German diplomat Michael Steiner, who is the UN secretary general's special representative in Kosovo (SRSG), was "far-reaching and forward-looking", Robertson said.

"The SRSG's initiative, in particular the seven points outlined in his address to the citizens of Mitrovica, has my full support," the military alliance's secretary general said.
"The proposals offer a unique opportunity to make practical improvements to the daily lives of the Serb community in Kosovo," he said, pledging the support of Kosovo's NATO-led force (KFOR).

An isolated northern Serb enclave in the ethnic Albanian-dominated province of Kosovo, Kosovska Mitrovica has been the scene of violent clashes between the two communities with KFOR and UN police caught in the middle.

Steiner's plan unveiled Tuesday involves a combination of security and economic measures aimed at creating stability in the flashpoint town.

It calls for joint administration by the two communities, decentralisation and an economic boost through a donors' conference to encourage investment in Kosovska Mitrovica, once known as an industrial centre.

However, the plan's success relies on participation by Serbs in local elections on October 26, with a four-year mandate at stake.

"I encourage all members of the Serb community to take advantage of this opportunity to ensure a better future," the NATO chief said.

"As in the past, KFOR will ensure that these elections will be carried out in a secure environment."

The United States on Wednesday gave firm backing to the plan and called on Serbs to participate in elections.

Kosovo came under UN and NATO control in June 1999, after NATO halted a crackdown of Serb forces led by former president Slobodan Milosevic on the independence-minded ethnic Albanians in the Yugoslav province.

UN digs up remains of 28 more bodies in Kosovo

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, Oct 3 (AFP) - United Nations forensic experts seeking evidence on war crimes in Kosovo have dug up the remains of 28 bodies believed to have been buried in 1999 in a village in the west of the province, a UN official said Wednesday.
The bodies were found in individual graves near the village cemetery in Brekovac, close to Djakovica, some 90 kilometers (55 miles) west of the provincial capital Pristina, UN mission spokesman Andrea Angeli said.

"Individual citizen informed us of the existence of these graves. We believe the bodies were buried in mid 1999," Angeli said.

The remains, exhumed in the last 48 hours, were taken to a UN-run morgue in the town of Orahovac, some 70 kilometers west of the provincial capital Pristina.

"They will be examined and identified there. So far there is no indication as to their ethnicity," Angeli said.

Kosovo, which is formally a province of Serbia, came under UN and NATO administration in 1999, following NATO's 78-day air war against Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic's forces.

Another 28 bodies exhumed in Kosovo

PRISTINA - B92-- United Nations forensic experts seeking evidence on war crimes in Kosovo have dug up the remains of 28 bodies believed to have been buried in 1999 in a village in the west of the province, a UN official said today.The bodies were found in individual graves near the village cemetery in Brekovac, close to Djakovica, some 90 kilometers (55 miles) west of the provincial capital Pristina, UN mission spokesman Andrea Angeli said.

"Individual citizen informed us of the existence of these graves. We believe the bodies were buried in mid 1999," Angeli said.
The remains, exhumed in the last 48 hours, were taken to a UN- run morgue in the town of Orahovac, some 70 kilometers west of the provincial capital Pristina.

"They will be examined and identified there. So far there is no indication as to their ethnicity," Angeli said.
Kosovo, which is formally a province of Serbia, came under UN and NATO administration in 1999, following NATO's 78-day air war against Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic's forces.

Covic and Steiner race to woo Serbs

PRISTINA --FoNet- Belgrade's Kosovo liaison chief Nebojsa Covic has drafted his own plan for the decentralisation of power in Kosovo, Koha Ditore writes today, citing unnamed sources within the province's UN Administration.

Covic's plan includes the conditions under which Serbs would vote in this month's local government elections in Kosovo, adds the Pristina daily.

According to Koha, UN Governor Michael Steiner launched an offensive this week in an attempt to beat Covic to the post by persuading Kosovo Serbs that they would be better served by UNMIK's plans for their future.

Kosovo Serbs dismiss UN plan for Mitrovica as "political marketing trick"

BBC Monitoring Service

Pristina, 3 October: UNMIK [UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo] chief Michael Steiner's seven-point plan for the resolution of the problem of Kosovska Mitrovica and its future as a united city, is nothing else than a political marketing trick, the head of the Povratak coalition party club, Rada Trajkovic, said on Thursday [3 October].

The problem of Kosovo-Metohija should not be fragmented by focusing only on the problem of northern Mitrovica, Trajkovic told Tanjug after a session of the provincial parliament.

At today's session she demanded that the heads of the transitional Kosovo institutions - Kosovo President Ibrahim Rugova, Premier Bairan Rexhepi and Parliament President Nedzad Daci - are held responsible for abusing the multiethnic transitional institutions and intensifying the independence problem, as this is contrary to the constitutional framework and UN Security Council Resolution 1244.

UN chief in Kosovo pleased with Belgrade's acceptance of plan for Mitrovica

BBC Monitoring Service

Pristina, 3 October: Today, following a meeting with Nebojsa Covic, chairman of the Kosovo and Metohija Coordination Centre, Michael Steiner, chief of UNMIK [UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo], conveyed his satisfaction with the fact that his plan for Kosovska Mitrovica has been accepted, adding that all leading nations of the international community had endorsed the plan.
Steiner told journalists after a meeting in Pristina that some individuals opposed this plan, adding that in doing so they were not only resisting UNMIK but also the international community and the authorities in Belgrade.
"The authorities in Belgrade, judging by today's meeting, had accepted the programme for Mitrovica, but I cannot say whether they had supported it in full," Steiner said.
The UNMIK chief voiced his satisfaction over the fact "the authorities in Belgrade urged the Kosovo Serbs to take part in the election" in the province called for 26 October.
Prodded about his reaction to the remarks of Albanian MPs in the Kosovo Assembly that, in presenting the plan for Mitrovica, he had violated the Constitutional Framework, Steiner said he will be delighted "to be able to present the plan to the widest audiences," accepting in this way the deputies' invitation to speak about the plan for Kosovska Mitrovica at the 10 October assembly session.
Steiner at the beginning of the talks with journalists said that the most time today had been devoted to the return of displaced persons to Kosovo.

Largest Serbian diaspora group to meet in USA, discuss Kosovo, Bosnia

BBC Monitoring Service

Belgrade, 3 October: The 12th annual convention of the Congress of Serbian Unity [CSU or KSU in Serbia], which is one of the leading organizations of the Serbian diaspora, will begin tomorrow in Chicago [Illinois, USA], the Belgrade KSU office said today.
This two-day gathering, the statement said, would be dedicated to the economic forum [as received] and the topic would be the situation in Kosovo-Metohija, the situation in the [Bosnian] Serb Republic as well as other current topics.

Kosovo: UNMIK forensic experts find remains of 35 bodies near Djakovica

Kosovska Mitrovica, 3 October: Kosovo-Metohija Coordination Centre and UNMIK [UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo] forensic experts found in the hamlet of Brekovac near Djakovica the remains of 35 bodies, believed to belong to Kosovo Serbs.
Head of the Coordination Centre's exhumation office Slavisa Dobricanin said on Thursday [3 October] that traces of torture and abuse, including handcuffs, had been found on the bodies.

Dobricanin told the Kontakt Plus radio of Kosovska Mitrovica that the exhumation had lasted for the past three days.

"Thirty-five bodies were exhumed. It is not completely certain, but I believe that they belong to Serbs," Dobricanin said, and added that the bodies had been transferred to the autopsy centre in Orahovac and that autopsy and identification of the bodies would be completed next week.

Kosovo Serb bloc seeks sacking of premier, Speaker over independence demands

BBC Monitoring Service

Pristina, 3 October: The Serbs [deputies] in the Kosovo Assembly have asked for the dismissal of the provincial [Kosovo] prime minister and the Assembly Speaker, Bajram Rexhepi and Nexhat Daci, while the [ethnic] Albanians [in the Assembly] targeted UNMIK [UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo] chief Michael Steiner.
The chief [whip] of the [Kosovo Serb] Return Coalition's deputy floor group, Rada Trajkovic, explained this demand, which also included a demand that [Kosovo] President Ibrahim Rugova's responsibility should also be established, by saying that he [Rugova], Rexhepi and Daci were abusing the institutions of the system in order to propagate Kosovo's independence.
"The role of Return deputies is not to sit in institutions through which functionaries aspire to realize an independent Kosovo but rather to have respect for human rights ensured through them," Rada Trajkovic said.
Albanian deputies, on the other hand, demanded Steiner's accountability because he "overstepped his authorities" by publishing the programme to solve the situation in Kosovska Mitrovica. The Assembly decided to submit a demand to Steiner to address the deputies during the first coming [parliamentary] session set to convene on 10 October and explain the programme which had been offered.

Serbian official: Belgrade just coordinating final decision by Kosovo Serbs

BBC Monitoring Service

[Announcer] The chairman of the [Serbian] Coordinating Centre for Kosovo-Metohija, [Serbian Deputy Prime Minister] Nebojsa Covic, has said in a statement for B92 that he views UNMIK [UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo] chief Michael Steiner contacting Kosovo Serbs to take part in the coming local elections in the province [of Kosovo] positively. However, it is not good that this was done on a take-it-or-leave-it basis, Covic said, adding that this offer [by Steiner] was yet to be realized, too.
[Covic] Representatives of the Serbs in Kosovo-Metohija will make the final decision on whether this [plan by UNMIK for Kosovska Mitrovica] will be accepted and what modifications will be demanded. This is about them. They live down there [in Kosovo] and we are here to coordinate. We will voice our thoughts and our stance on this topic but they will make the final decision. Belgrade must neither exert pressure nor assume a cheerleading role. I repeat - we are coordinating the whole activity.
[Announcer] We asked Nebojsa Covic in what sense Belgrade must not meddle in decisions made by Serbs in Kosovo.
[Covic] Well, in any sense. You know that UNMIK has very frequently used the line: What does Belgrade have to do here? Why Belgrade? How come Belgrade? Of course, Belgrade has been constructive all the time and it is being very constructive now, but the representatives of the Serb community in Kosovo-Metohija will make the final decision.
[Announcer] Covic confirmed that he would meet Steiner in Pristina tomorrow so that they could continue talks about decentralization, return [of displaced Kosovo Serbs] and local police services.

Serbian official says Belgrade stands for unified Kosovo

BBC Monitoring Service

[Presenter] The Belgrade authorities have accepted UNMIK's [UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo] proposal for unification of northern and southern parts of Kosovska Mitrovica in principle. This plan must be further elaborated and local [Kosovo] Serbs must also accept it, one concludes in Pristina after a meeting between the chief of international mission [UNMIK] Michael Steiner and the chief of [Yugoslav, Serbia] Coordinating Centre [for Kosovo-Metohija], [Serbian Deputy Prime Minister] Nebosja Covic.
[Reporter] According to UNMIK's chief Michael Steiner, two topics were dominating today's talks - return of displaced Serbs and UNMIK's plan for unification of Kosovska Mitrovica. Belgrade gave its support for the aforementioned plan in global terms, Steiner said, announcing that he would elaborate all seven points in great details [of the plan] together with Nebojsa Covic during some of the following meetings. According to Steiner, Nebojsa Covic advocated a unified Mitrovica in the future.
[Covic, voice over phone] We are for a unified Kosovo-Metohija, in line with to [UNSC] Resolution 1244, as an integral part, naturally, of the Republic of Serbia and, of course, of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
Our concept of decentralization is not the one according to which we were allowed to divide anything - towns in two or I do not know how many parts - but rather that which the life imposes on us, what the reality imposes, the ground...
[Presenter] Covic demanded of UNMIK better security conditions for those Serbs who wanted to return to Kosovo-Metohija. The chief of Coordinating Centre told BK TV that every idea which was leading to reconciliation was good but added that it had to be elaborated in great details. One most strongly condemned the abduction and the rape of two underage girls from the northern part of Mitrovica. Steiner informed Covic that four [ethnic] Albanians were arrested, noting that they [UN police] were after the fifth one.

Leader

The Scotsman - United Kingdom

FORMER President Clinton got a bigger ovation than Tony Blair at the Labour Party conference - and that was before he started speaking. His message was that we had to become a genuine global community with shared values. To underwrite the point, he and the movie star Kevin Spacey paid a late-night visit to the local McDonald's. With 29,000 restaurants in 121 countries, few companies are more international. You can even buy a Big Mac in the Kurdish zone of Iraq - but not, so far, Baghdad.

However, Mr Clinton may have surprised delegates (not to mention casual customers for hamburgers) when he called for action against Iraq - though he got more applause when he argued for action to be taken through the UN. We agree - if that is possible. But it was Mr Clinton who, when faced with a Russian veto in the UN, rightly took unilateral action and bombed Yugoslavia to free Kosovo from Serbian ethnic cleansing.
Some of Mr Clinton's strangely doting audience think regime change in Iraq is about making the world safe for US fast food. Far from it. Apart from anything else, four-fifths of McDonald's outlets are owned by local franchisees. Serving in one might be fitting retirement for Saddam Hussein. He could even get to meet Bill Clinton.

Serbia deputy premier deems UN plan for Mitrovica "interesting"

BBC Monitoring Service

Pristina, 3 October: Nebojsa Covic, president of the Coordination Centre for Kosovo and Metohija, said that the officials of this centre during a meeting with UNMIK [UN Interim Administration Mission for Kosovo] representatives in Pristina responded positively to a plan for Kosovska Mitrovica, stressing that the conditions offered had to be guaranteed by signing the agreement. "The seven points proposed by [UNMIK chief] Mr Steiner are interesting, generally speaking, and we view them positively, seeing that they incorporate many of our own ideas. However, they still need to be worked out," Covic told Beta following the meeting in Pristina.
Representatives of the local Serb community are evidently highly mistrustful, because they have lead a difficult life and lacked the freedom of movement up to this point, the Serbian deputy prime minister explained.
"I believe the we must reach an agreement on this. We have a few days. It will depend on this agreement whether we will be convincing in persuading the Serbs to take part in the local election. I believe that this is the only way to proceed," Covic said.
He said that the officials of the Coordination Centre for Kosovo and Metohija had requested from UNMIK today details about the kidnapping and mistreatment of two teenage girls from a multi-cultural portacabin [an initiative to encourage socializing of young people of different ethnicity] in southern part of Kosovska Mitrovica, pointing out that this incident could have a major impact on the Serbian and Bosniak ethnic community.
Covic confirmed that he and Steiner chiefly discussed the return [of refugees].
"We agree on the key issues, that the return should be voluntary and feasible, that it should be dignified and safe. However, there are still disagreements regarding an individual return," Covic told Beta.
"We will not agree and we cannot agree that representatives of the local Albanian community be the ones who will give a consent whether somebody can return to his home or not," Covic pointed out, adding that this problem had been clearly formulated at the meeting today.
Covic also announced the drafting of a practical and specific plan for the return, which will contain figures, statistics, and analyses.
Covic and Steiner in the course of the talks also touched upon the police service in northern Kosovo.

Multiethnic police discover large cache of weapons in south Serbia

BBC Monitoring Service

Presevo, 3 October: In a wider region of the village of Kurbalija in Presevo municipality, around 500 metres from the administrative line towards Kosovo-Metohija, members of the multiethnic police of the Prseevo OUP (municipal police administration) discovered certain amount of arms and ammunition today, when searching terrain.
The arms and the ammunition were hidden and buried in a forest next to a village road in the place called Osmanska maghala, while seven submachine guns, one automatic riffle and 14 hand grenades - all Chinese made - one pair of binoculars, several thousand ammunition pieces for riffles and pistols as well as a large quantity of combat military material were found there.
As Bujanovac Press Centre reported, a member of the Coordinating Centre of governments of Yugoslavia and Serbia, Mica Markovic, as well as members of European Union's observing mission visited the site

Austria evicts asylum seekers, sends Kosovans back to Pristina

By Christine Boggis

VIENNA, Oct 3 (AFP) - Austria began Thursday sending Kosovan asylum seekers back to Pristina as part of a tighter asylum policy which plans to evict hundreds of people from overflowing hostels by Christmas, officials said.
"The new policy is leading to dramatic waves of evictions across Austria. We were told they plan to evict 100 people from state accommodation each week, and 1,000 by Christmas," Andrea Huber, refugee expert with aid agency Caritas, told AFP.
She listed minors and young mothers with small babies among those made homeless by the move.

"We do not know what to do with these people, the asylum hostels are full. At the same time it is impossible to leave them on the streets. At the moment we are completely at a loss," said Huber.

A new interior ministry directive which came into force Tuesday states that asylum seekers from the European Economic Area and those negotiating European Union membership have no right to state accommodation when seeking asylum in Austria.
Asylum seekers from Russia, Armenia, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Macedonia, Yugoslavia and Nigeria lose their right to state shelter if their first instance asylum application is turned down.

Forty-two men from Kosovo flew to Pristina from Vienna Thursday, the interior ministry said.

"Anyone who comes here saying he is seeking asylum but really seeking work will not be provided for. Only those people who really need asylum will get it," Interior Minister Ernst Strasser said in an interview with the daily Standard Thursday.

He noted that 90 percent of asylum applications were unjustified.
Human rights groups including Amnesty International and the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) have slammed Austria's stricter asylum policy, saying it breaches European Union guidelines and denies asylum seekers the right to a fair hearing.
"The UNHCR fears the regulation could also trigger an exodus of asylum seekers from Austria to other EU countries," the UNHCR warned in a statement Tuesday, dubbing the move "unhelpful".

"That is complete nonsense," Strasser said of accusations the directive breaches EU policy. "If our actions breach any kind of policy, then Germany, England and France have breached it long ago," he added.

He stressed that those Kosovans who returned to Pristina Thursday did so of their own free will.

But Huber noted: "Naturally they are under a great deal of pressure. It is a question of leaving or being homeless, so they agree," she said.

"Being homeless does not just mean they do not have a roof over their heads -- it means they do not have an address, which is necessary for asylum proceedings," she added.
"I understand that people cannot really be counselled on returning to their countries of origin if they are out on the streets," admitted interior ministry spokesman Wolf Szymanski.

"That is why we are making efforts to make it possible for them to return home," including measures such as flying Kosovans back to Pristina, he told AFP.

Szymanski denied criticism that the conservative interior ministry is tightening asylum laws in a bid to win votes from its far-right coalition partner ahead of legislative ballots on November 24.

While Austria's opposition social-democratic and Green parties have slammed the evictions of asylum seekers as "unacceptable", the far-right Freedom Party told its conservative coalition partner the new directive was "too lax".

Macedonia's new parliament reconvenes after opposition election win

SKOPJE, Oct 3 (AFP) - The Macedonian parliament held its first session on Thursday, following elections last month that were won by a coalition of opposition groups led by the Social Democratic Union (SDSM).

"We should all work together towards a better future for Macedonia and its citizens," said the SDSM's Nikola Popovski, who was elected on Thursday as speaker of the 120-seat parliament by 72 votes to 30.

Popovski said the deputies should "complete economic reforms" in Macedonia and concentrate on "completing the implementation of the peace accord".

The Western-brokered accord, signed last year, ended more than seven months of conflict between the government forces and ethnic Albanian rebels of the National Liberation Army (NLA), which threatened to spill over into a new Balkans war.

The peace deal paved the way for an early parliamentary election on September 15 and offered more rights to the ethnic Albanian minority in Macedonia, which makes up about 23 percent of the Balkan country's population.

The new assembly is dominated by the SDSM-led coalition Together from Macedonia, which has 60 deputies and whose leader, Branko Crvenkovski, is widely expected to become a future prime minister.

Over the next 10 days, President Boris Trajkovski is expected to propose a candidate to form a new cabinet, who then has another 20 days to chose his government.

The SDSM, which lacks an absolute majority, is expected to form a coalition with the most important ethnic Albanian party, the Democratic Union of Integration (DUI) of Ali Ahmeti, the rebel NLA's former political leader.

Ahmeti's party won 16 seats in the assembly but the leader and his two allies, also former guerrilla commanders, were absent from Thursday's session due to their "busy agenda," DUI spokesman Agron Buxhaku said.

Despite the amnesty offered to former NLA guerrillas, many in Macedonia still consider them to be "terrorists" and a Western diplomat in Skopje told AFP there "were pressures" on the three former rebels not to attend parliament.

"One part of the international community was against Ahmeti taking part in the elections. But as he was elected thanks to his popularity, we estimate that it is better for him to abstain from attending the sessions," said the diplomat, who requested anonymity.

But the diplomat said, nevertheless, that the DUI members "should join the government".
The new parliament consists of two coalitions. One groups Macedonians and three ethnic Albanian parties; the other is made up of Macedonians and several other ethnic minorities.

The September poll went ahead peacefully, despite security fears in the wake of violence that was blamed on ethnic Albanian extremist groups in the west of the country.

Kwasniewski support Macedonian candidature for NATO and European Union

Skopje (dpa) - Polish President Alexsander Kwasniewski supported Macedonia's candidature for the membership in NATO and European Union on Friday, ending his two-day visit to troubled Balkan country.

Kwasniewski's visit was, however, overshadowed by the constitution of the country's new parliament and the announced start of talks on the future government between Social Democrats and former ethnic Albanian rebels turned politicians.

The Polish president, the first high-ranking foreign statesman to visit Macedonia for a long time, praised the country's leadership for the manner in which they handled the ethnic crisis that brought the country to the brink of civil war last year.

``After the parliamentary elections, Macedonia can be considered a country with the potential to build multi-ethnic society on the widely respectable level'', Kwasniewski said at the end of his visit.

Kwasniewski met his Macedonian counterpart in Skopje for bilateral talks with high-ranking Macedonian officials and leading party leaders, including country's future Premier Branko Crvenkovski and ethnic Albanian politicians.

Kwasniewski said that ``unlike the economy, bilateral relations between Poland and Macedonia are developing fairly well''.
Trajkovski said the topics before the two countries included a free-trade agreement, an easing of the visa regime, co-operation in fighting organized crime, and support for Macedonian membership in NATO and the European Union.

Macedonia's first parliament elected since last year's insurgency convenes

SKOPJE, Macedonia (AP) _ Macedonia's first parliament to be elected since an insurgency shook the country convened Thursday amid hopes the new lawmakers would move the country toward ethnic reconciliation and stability.

The center-left Social Democratic Alliance, which won a majority in the 120-seat parliament, is expected to form a government with members of the most successful ethnic Albanian party, the Democratic Union for Integration, led by former rebel leader, Ali Ahmeti.

Ahmeti did not attend the session. The outgoing government has issued an arrest warrant for him, accusing him of war crimes.

Ethnic Albanian rebels seized control of the country's northwest last year, saying they were fighting for broader rights for their community, nearly a third of Macedonia's 2 million people.

The six-month war ended with a Western-brokered peace deal, giving the minority broader rights under the constitution.

Using a newly won right, ethnic Albanians addressed the parliament in their native language. Other deputies followed the discussion through interpreters.
The European Union foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, sent a letter to Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski, expressing support for a ``serene transition of the government.''

New Macedonian parliament begins work

Talks on new government to start on Friday, SDSM says

Skopje (dpa) - The new Macedonian parliament started work on Thursday, three weeks after the opposition swept to power with an overwhelming election victory.
The vice-president of Social Domocrat's party, Nikola Popovski was named a new parliament speaker, replacing the hawkish Stojan Andov who loudly confronted the international community during the months of implementation of last year's Ohrid peace deal.
``As new speaker of parliament I hope that we can together provide a better future for Macedonia, and built the assembly into the most respected institution in the country'', Popovski said.

The former ruling VMRO-DPMNE, which gained 33 seats in the assembly, strongly opposed Popovski's nomination, accusing Social Democrats of ``collaborating with former rebels turned politicians''.

However, three top leaders of the strongest ethnic Albanian party - Democratic Integrative Union (BDI) - Ali Ahmeti, Gezim Ostreni and Fazli Veliu did not show at the opening session.

``We have decided to take our share in the new beginning for Macedonia. But three deputies from our ranks were unable to come today. They will take part in parliament sessions in the future'', the BDI spokesman Agron Buxhaku told the house.

Macedonia's new parliament, which now includes dozen former commanders of the ethnic Albanian National Liberation Army (UCK), is widely seen as a crucial element for lasting stability of the ethnically divided country.

Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski, outgoing Premier Ljubco Georgievski and the country's high-ranking officials, as well as numerous foreign diplomats were present at the session.

The session was to be followed by talks on the new government comprising a coalition led by Macedonian Social Democrats (SDSM) and the BDI, SDSM spokesman Jani Makarduli comfirmed.

It is expected that President Trajkovski will hand over the mandate to form the new government to SDSM's leader Branko Crvenkovski as early as Monday, officials in Skopje said.

According to the sources within SDSM and BDI, the SDSM-led coalition will take 11 ministries, and three mandates will be given to the former rebels.

BDI earlier requested one of three ministries that would give the party a place in the National Security Council, but it still remains to be seen if Social Democrats are ready for such a compromise.

SDSM's high ranking official and former defence minister Vlado Buckovski said Thursday that ``it has been agreed that SDSM takes over ministries of interior and defence''.

The National Defence Council includes thepresident, prime minister, speaker of the parliament and ministers of interior, defence and foreign affairs.

Macedonia ex-rebels take seats in parliament

By Kole Casule

SKOPJE, Oct 3 (Reuters) - Former ethnic Albanian guerrillas entered Macedonia's parliament on Thursday to take up seats they won in September elections, alongside nationalists who branded them terrorists during last year's insurgency.

Wearing suits instead of the military fatigues they sported during a rebellion that brought Macedonia to the brink of civil war, they attended the constituent session after the September 15 vote, gearing up for political rather than armed battles.

But Ali Ahmeti, head of the now disbanded guerrilla National Liberation Army (NLA), and two of his top lieutenants did not take part. There had been fears their presence could anger the Macedonian majority.

Western powers have hailed the election, free of ethnic violence, as a major boost for peace heralding the start of a new era in the troubled and divided former Yugoslav republic.

Opposition Social Democrats trounced ruling nationalists within the majority, while minority Albanians switched support from the discredited party which had shared power in government for the last four years to a new team led by Ahmeti, 43.

At least four ex-commanders of rebels denounced by NATO last year as a ``bunch of murderous thugs'' sat in the same assembly room as their old enemies Ljubco Georgievski, the outgoing prime minister, and Ljube Boskovski, his hawkish interior minister.

They all stood up when the national anthem was played.
TABLES TURNED
Georgievski and Boskovski vowed while in power not to rest until Ahmeti and his men were put behind bars.

They are now in opposition and Ahmeti's Democratic Union for Integration, which won 16 seats in the 120-seat legislature, is expected to get ministerial posts in a government coalition with the Social Democrats, with 60 deputies.

Government talks are expected to get under way on Friday.
Ahmeti, now advocating reconciliation, is regarded among Albanians as a hero for fighting for his community's rights.

But many Macedonians still see him as a terrorist who tried to grab land from them at gunpoint in a conflict that killed about 100 people from both ethnic groups.

European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana called in a letter to Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski for a peaceful inaugural session of parliament.

``A peaceful constitution of the new assembly and a serene transition would further underline that the country has decided to turn the page on crisis and division,'' Solana said.

Last month's election was a key plank of the Western-brokered peace agreement that ended the February-August rebellion in 2001.

The rebels laid down their weapons in return for better rights for the large Albanian minority -- roughly one-third of the population -- including the right to use their language in parliament, and an amnesty.

Apart from lingering ethnic tension, the new administration faces huge problems in other areas, including a struggling economy -- gross domestic product fell by 4.6 percent in 2001 and unemployment stands at 40 percent.

Failure to elect Serbian president would bring instability, Kostunica says''

By MISHA SAVIC

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (AP) _ Serbia could slip back into anarchy if a presidential runoff election fails to decisively select a new leader, Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica said.
Kostunica appealed to voters to cast ballots in the Oct. 13 race, urging them to recall that they ousted former leader Slobodan Milosevic in order to have a free and democratic Serbia.

``If we fail to accomplish the reforms, bring new, better laws and a constitution ... we shall start falling apart at the seams,'' Kostunica said.

Kostunica's opponent, Deputy Prime Minister Miroljub Labus, has also appealed to voters to come to the polls, since the law requires that at least half of the electorate must vote in order for the election to be valid.

Failing to hit the 50 percent threshold ``would precipitate Serbia into deep chaos and anarchy,'' Kostunica warned.

Under Serbia's laws, a new race would be held in two months if the turnout falls below 50 percent. The time lag could create political uncertainty and a power vacuum in the larger Yugoslav republic even as the country seeks desperately needed loans from abroad.
Kostunica argued that the political chaos could be exploited by ethnic Albanians in Kosovo, who want independence. The province has been under the control of NATO and the United Nations since the end of the 1999 war, and its final status is yet to be decided.
The first round of the vote on Sunday featured a turnout of 55 percent, one of the lowest since the multiparty system was restored in the 1990s.

Kostunica spoke shortly after an ultranationalist candidate, Vojislav Seselj, called for a boycott of the Oct. 13 race, claiming that the first round was flawed and that he had been ``robbed.''

The allegations have been dismissed by the State Electoral Commission but Seselj said he would take the issue to the Constitutional Court.

Seselj called on voters to stay home. If the vote is invalidated, he would get another chance to run for the presidency.

Seselj won a surprising 22 percent in the first round after winning Milosevic's endorsement. The former leader is on trial before the U.N. war crimes court in The Hague, Netherlands, for atrocities allegedly committed during three Balkan wars.
Kostunica expressed hope that the runoff would succeed. He said that Seselj's call for boycott is ``a relief in a way.''

``When I win, nobody will be able to say that I won with the support of Seselj's supporters,'' Kostunica said.

Kostunica, a moderate nationalist, is running because his present post of the federal, Yugoslav president will likely disappear as part of reforms to turn Yugoslavia into a loose union of its two republics, Serbia and Montenegro.

His rival in the runoff, Labus, is a protege of Kostunica's chief political opponent, the prime minister of Serbia, Zoran Djindjic. Kostunica and Djindjic were two dominant leaders of the move to oust Milosevic two years ago, but later quarreled over the pace of reforms and relations with the West.

Kostunica also accused Djindjic of wanting the elections to fail because if ``there is no Serbian president ... there is no longer an important lever of power'' to challenge Djindjic's government.

Nationalist boycott call may wreck Serbian vote

By Gordana Kukic

BELGRADE, Oct 3 (Reuters) - Ultra-nationalist leader Vojislav Seselj urged his supporters on Thursday to boycott the second round of Serbia's presidential election, dramatically increasing the chances that the vote will be invalid.
Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica, a moderate nationalist, came out ahead in the first round and is favourite to win the October 13 run-off against Yugoslav Deputy Prime Minister Miroljub Labus, a liberal economist.

But the election must attract at least 50 percent of registered voters to be valid and Seselj, a strong third in the first round, may have a big influence on whether that threshold is reached. First round turnout was 55.5 percent.

Mainstream politicians have warned Serbia it will face a political crisis if it fails to elect a president, dealing a blow to efforts by the reformists who toppled Slobodan Milosevic to establish stability after a decade of warfare and poverty.

``We should turn out at the elections to prevent Serbia from falling definitively into chaos and anarchy,'' Kostunica said.

But Seselj, who is supported by Milosevic from the cells of the U.N. war crimes tribunal, alleged fraud in the first round -- defying reports from local and international monitors. He told his voters to ignore pleas to turn out for round two.

``Considering that the first round was irregular, we call on all citizens who voted for me not to respond and not to cast their ballots in the second round,'' said Seselj, a former paramilitary leader who heads the Serbian Radical Party.

``The failure of presidential elections opens the door for early elections at all levels. The Serbian Radical Party demands such early elections,'' the man once branded a fascist by the United States declared at a news conference.

STARTING FROM SCRATCH

If the second round is invalid, the whole presidential election process has to be repeated, as happened five years ago.

In the meantime, incumbent Milan Milutinovic would see out his term, which expires around the end of the year.
Milutinovic is expected to surrender to the war crimes tribunal, which has indicted him over atrocities in Kosovo, when he leaves office. If no president has been elected by then, parliament speaker Natasa Micic will take over his duties.

Kostunica and Labus, veterans of the alliance that ousted Milosevic two years ago but has since split apart in acrimony, won 30.89 and 27.36 percent of the first round vote respectively while Seselj garnered 23.24 percent.

The Yugoslav president is favourite to win the run-off as most of the nine other first-round candidates were nationalists and their voters are more likely to switch to him than Labus. He said on Thursday he was certain the second round would be valid.
Kostunica is looking for a new job as his post as head of the Yugoslav federation will soon cease to exist in its present form. Under constitutional changes, Yugoslavia will be recast as a looser union of its two republics, Serbia and Montenegro.

Marko Blagojevic, spokesman for a local election monitoring agency, said it would be hard to overcome the 50 percent hurdle after Seselj's decision but the two candidates might be able to persuade people who abstained in the first round to turn out.

``In that case, there's still a chance for the election to succeed even if all Seselj's voters listen to him and don't vote,'' said Blagojevic of the Belgrade-based Centre for Free Elections and Democracy.

Serbian ultra-nationalist calls for boycott of presidential

BELGRADE, Oct 3 (AFP) - Serbian ultra-nationalist Vojislav Seselj called on voters Thursday to boycott the run-off of the presidential election on October 13, heightening concern that the poll could be invalid because of low turnout.

Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica faces Deputy Prime Minister Miroljub Labus in the second-round vote, which requires a turnout of more than 50 percent of voters to be valid.

"We are calling on all those who voted for me in the first round to stay away from the polling stations and not to vote for either Kostunica or Labus," Seselj said during a news conference.
"We are one hundred percent convinced that the second round will fail," he told reporters.
Seselj came third in the first round on September 29, with more than 23 percent of votes.
Kostunica obtained 31 percent of votes and Labus 27 percent. Labus on Wednesday called on voters to go out and vote amid growing concern that the poll could fail if turnout is low.

"I am calling voters to go out and vote," he said, adding that "whoever is elected, the country's interest is to get a president."
More than 55 percent of Serbia's 6.5 million voters cast their ballots on Sunday in the first round of voting.

Serbia's election has been seen as a key test of the Yugoslav republic's commitment to reforms launched after former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic was ousted following a popular uprising in October 2000.

U.S. writes off part of Yugoslav debt

By JOVANA GEC

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (AP) _ The United States forgave part of Yugoslavia's debt on Thursday, in a sign of improving relations with the country's reformist leadership.
The agreement writes off US$353.7 billion, or 66 percent, of the US$589.4 billion debt. It was signed by the U.S. ambassador in Belgrade, William Montgomery, and Yugoslavia's Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic.

Yugoslavia negotiated the deal with the Paris Club of creditors in November. But negotiations with the United States continued separately for months afterward in an effort to normalize relations.
Svilanovic was quoted by the state-run Tanjug news agency as saying that Yugoslavia expects further improvement in economic relations with the United States in the months to come. He said the agreement Thursday was the result of ``long and exhausting'' work.
Montgomery said the U.S. move was a sign of support for the economic reforms, which began after the current pro-Western leadership ousted former President Slobodan Milosevic, Tanjug reported.

Yugoslavia faced international sanctions during Milosevic's era as a punishment for the country's role in more than a decade of Balkan bloodshed. The United States has been cautious in fully restoring economic ties with Yugoslavia and has so far refused to release frozen assets, though Svilanovic said the issue was under discussion and should be resolved in the months to come.

The U.S.-Yugoslav agreement is likely to boost the position of Deputy Prime Minister Miroljub Labus, a reformer who faces Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica in an Oct. 13 runoff vote for president of Serbia.

Labus, an economist, had been instrumental in negotiating the bailout, and has made continuing economic reform a cornerstone of his election campaign. He is closely allied with the pro-Western government run by Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic.
Labus also signed a similar agreement writing off part of Yugoslavia's debt to Switzerland with that country's ambassador, Gaudenz Ruf, Tanjug reported.

Bosnia election rallies pit fear against hope

By Nedim Dervisbegovic

BANJA LUKA, Bosnia, Oct 3 (Reuters) - Politicians in Bosnia wrapped up a close and bitter election campaign at big rallies on Thursday, with some urging Muslims, Serbs and Croats to bury their wartime hatred -- and others, never to forget.
Western peace envoys present Saturday's presidential and parliamentary polls as a choice between reformists charting a multi-ethnic path to prosperity, or nationalists fixated on fear and division.

Reconciliation was not in the air at a hardline Serb Democratic Party (SDS) rally in the Bosnian Serb capital. About 4,000 supporters roared ``Serbia! Serbia!'' as speaker after speaker championed a fierce defence of Serb national interests.

The SDS has tried to distance itself publicly from its founder, fugitive war crimes suspect Radovan Karadzic. But images of his face were everywhere, including on a T-shirt with the words: ``We know where he is.''

Meanwhile, at least 10,000 Bosnian Croats including many wartime officials waved red-and-white chequered Croatian flags and sang the Croatian anthem at a rally of the nationalist Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) in the southern town of Mostar.

The HDZ still has widespread support among the smallest of Bosnia's main ethnic groups, on a staunchly hardline ticket.

The main nationalist Muslim Party of Democratic Action (SDA) packed a sports hall on Wednesday night with supporters waving green Islamic flags, singing traditional Muslim songs and chanting ``Allahu Akbar'' (God is Greatest).

Speakers talked of a fight for survival and said prayers for those killed in the 1992-1995 siege of Sarajevo and the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of up to 8,000 Muslim men and boys by Serbs.

``We are the only nation in Europe that must fight for our survival,'' actor Emir Hadzihafizbegovic said.

The crowd cheered wildly as Bosnia's wartime President Alija Izetbegovic, now retired from politics, shuffled into the arena.

MANTRA OF UNITY AND REFORM
It was a very different scene in front of Sarajevo's national theatre at the final rally of the reformist Social Democrats, Bosnia's biggest party, which reaches out to all ethnic groups.

``Our future is nourished by optimism,'' party leader Zlatko Lagumdzija said. ``We are light -- we are hope.''

Several thousand mainly young people sang together: ``We are young, beautiful and smart, think and live decisively.''

The mantra there, and later at a gathering of the moderate mainly Muslim Party for Bosnia and Herzegovina, was that the Western prescription of unity and market reform is Bosnia's best hope for enduring stability and peace.

The election will determine if these and other reformists can sustain or improve a delicate balance of power that let them eject the big mono-ethnic nationalist parties from power at the state level after the last elections in 2000.

Karadzic and his wartime military chief and fellow war crimes fugitive Ratko Mladic are symbols of a crippling war that the moderates want to consign to history this weekend.
But while the pair are still icons of heroism for many, they are symbols of hatred for others, like Srebrenica Mayor Desnica Radivojevic, a Serb who is running on the Muslim SDA ticket.

``We are ready to forgive but not to those who are hiding in Bosnian woods like snakes under stones,'' he told the SDA rally.

U.S. hopes to make example of Bosnian Serb leader's guilty plea to war crimes

WASHINGTON (AP) _ The United States on Thursday applauded the guilty plea of a Bosnian Serb political leader indicted for war crimes, and called on others wanted for war crimes to surrender themselves for trial.

The guilty plea by Biljana Plavsic should serve as an example for former Yugoslav officials to ``examine themselves'' and ``accept their responsibility,'' said State Department spokesman Richard Boucher. He referred specifically to military commander Gen. Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic, to whom Plavsic was closely associated.
Plavsic pleaded guilty to one count of crimes against humanity. Prosecutors at the U.N. war crimes tribunal dropped seven other charges, including genocide.

``We hope that her important step in expressing full and unconditional remorse for the harm that was done to innocent victims of the conflict will contribute to the reconciliation process in the region,'' Boucher said.

The United States will continue its pursuit of Mladic, Karadzic and other fugitives being sought by the international tribunal for Yugoslavia, Boucher said. ``We haven't succeeded yet, but the operative word is 'yet.' We intend to get them,'' Boucher said.

Twenty-three people are wanted by the tribunal for war crimes, and 26 are in pretrial proceedings, Boucher said. Twelve are currently on trial. The court has convicted 28 people, six of whom pleaded guilty, and acquitted five. Charges against 17 people were dismissed or withdrawn.

``They continue to add to the totals, and they get closer and closer to bringing to justice all of the people who need to be brought to justice,'' Boucher said.

Plavsic's guilty plea to have no consequences for Bosnian Serb entity: PM

BANJA LUKA, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Oct 3 (AFP) - Bosnian Serb Prime Minister Mladen Ivanic said Thursday that a guilty plea by former president Biljana Plavsic at the UN war crimes tribunal would not have "any consequences" for his entity.

"Trials in The Hague are trials of individuals, and not trials of institutions, entities or states, thus I do not think that her statement will have any consequences for Republika Srpska," Ivanic told journalists.

Plavsic pleaded guilty on Wednesday to crimes against humanity, becoming the highest level former Yugoslav leader to acknowledge a role in atrocities committed in the Balkan wars.

Bosnian Serb authorities have firmly rejected any idea of abolishing the country's two entities -- the Serbs' Republika Srpska and the Muslim-Croat Federation -- that were established under the Dayton peace accords that ended the 1992-1995 war.

The idea is supported by certain Bosnian Muslim and Croat politicians, who argue that Republika Srpska was created on the basis of a brutal ethnic cleansing campaign against non-Serbs.

Ivanic said that Plavsic's plea showed that it was "her belief that this is the best way to defend herself."

Plavsic, 72, changed her initial plea of not guilty, entered in January 2001 after she turned herself in to the court.

The court in turn dropped genocide and war crimes charges against her.

Plavsic was one of the closest allies of Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic, who is wanted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Karadzic ally wanted cash from Belgrade-prosecutors

By Abigail Levene

THE HAGUE, Oct 3 (Reuters) - Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect Momcilo Krajisnik asked Belgrade for two million dollars in cash to protect his associate Radovan Karadzic, one of the Hague tribunal's most wanted men, court documents showed on Thursday.

In a hand-written 1998 letter to former Yugoslav Deputy Prime Minister Nikola Sainovic, also now in detention in The Hague, Krajisnik said the money would be used for ``legally protecting Mr Radovan Karadzic, regarding the indictment by... The Hague.''

``Please provide us with two million U.S. dollars to be deposited at Privredna Banka, S. Sarajevo, at Pale, in cash,'' reads the brief letter, a typed English translation of which was contained in prosecution papers.

Prosecution lawyers are using the letter to argue that Krajisnik -- wartime speaker of the Bosnian Serb parliament, now at The Hague charged with crimes including genocide -- should be refused provisional release pending trial because he would be likely to escape.
Slobodan Milosevic was Yugoslav president at the time the letter was written. He was overthrown in 2000, arrested by the new reformist government and eventually handed over to The Hague in June 2001, only after intense pressure from the tribunal and the West.

It was not clear whether the letter was ever sent. Prosecutors said it was seized by French members of NATO-led peacekeepers when Krajisnik was arrested in April 2000 and given to the prosecution in August by the French embassy in The Hague.

ALLIES OF KARADZIC
Krajisnik is named on the same indictment as ex-Bosnian Serb President Biljana Plavsic, who on Wednesday unexpectedly changed her plea to guilty and will avoid trial.

During the 1992-5 Bosnian war, Krajisnik and Plavsic were close allies of Karadzic, accused by the U.N. tribunal of crimes including genocide for the siege of Sarajevo and the notorious 1995 Srebrenica massacre of thousands of Muslim men and boys.

Karadzic is widely believed to be hiding in mountainous eastern Bosnia, part of the country's Serb Republic, where he has escaped several swoops by peacekeepers.
Krajisnik has made many requests to be freed, all of them denied, since he was transferred to The Hague in 2000.

``If Krajisnik were to escape while on provisional release, the probability that he would be successfully rearrested and delivered to the custody of the tribunal to stand trial in January 2003 is remote,'' prosecutors said.

They argued that the letter showed that if he were released, Krajisnik might return to Bosnia's Serb Republic and disappear with the help of Karadzic's support network.
They noted Bosnian Serb authorities had never arrested a single tribunal indictee, and estimated seven publicly indicted people were currently at large in Bosnia's Serb Republic.

Prosecutors launched their Croatia and Bosnia cases against Milosevic last week, after winding up the Kosovo portion of their case against him earlier in September.

Milosevic trial shifts down a gear, indiscreet lawyer apologises by Peter Shard

THE HAGUE, Oct 3 (AFP) - After the cut-and-thrust of Slobodan Milosevic's showdown with Croatian President Stipe Mesic, his war crimes trial returned to more bread-and-butter matters on Thursday with the cross-examination of an anonymous witness.
And in a separate development, a lawyer appointed as a trial observer who gave an ill-judged interview to a Dutch newspaper last month about the trial of the former Yugoslav president, was ordered to apologise.
Michail Vladimiroff, who told the Haagsche Courant that if the trial were to end now Milosevic would be found guilty, told the court, under the watchful eye of Milosevic himself: "I should not have given this interview. I am responsible for the interview although I have not been quoted correctly."
Thursday's proceedings focused on events in 1991 in the Croatian province of Western Slavonia and in particular the multi-ethnic town of Pakrac, where atrocities were commited by both sides, according to the anonymous witness.
The witness, identified only as C037 to protect him from possible reprisals, is a moderate Serb politician from the region. He was quizzed about the treatment of Serbs taken prisoner by Croats and held in the town's police station and the basement of a department store.

Shielded from the gallery by a large grey screen, "Mr C37" as Milosevic insisted on addressing him, spoke of the period from August 1991 to the start of 1992 when around 100 Serbs were held hostage.

"They say they were tortured, beaten with electric wires, had electric currents passed through their bodies and were forced to cut the ears off each other and eat them," he said.
"Many were beaten up and tied to radiators and some were taken away and shot."
He said Serbs in the towns and villages of Western Slavonia who fled their homes had never been able to re-occupy them, as they had forfeited the right to them.
Those houses that were not torched or dynamited were occupied by Croats or sold off, he said.

Milosevic, who is conducting his own defence from the dock, seized on this information and reminded the court that Mesic had said that his Croatia was a law-abiding country.
"Do you mean to say that in present day Croatia, where the rule of law is in force, that Serbs are not allowed to own apartments?" he asked triumphantly.
In all, 61-year-old Milosevic faces more than 60 charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity for his involvement in the wars in Kosovo (1998-99), Croatia (1991-95) and Bosnia (1992-95).

For the campaign of ethnic cleansing of non-Serbs during the Bosnian war, the former Yugoslav president is also charged with genocide, the most serious of war crimes.
The first former head of state to go on trial for such charges, Milosevic could spend the rest of his life behind bars if found guilty.

Lawyer in Milosevic's trial defends his job after scandal over media comments

By KATARINA KRATOVAC

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) _ A lawyer appointed by the U.N. tribunal to help protect Slobodan Milosevic's interests apologized to the court Thursday after he was quoted as saying the former Yugoslav president will be found guilty of war crimes.
But Michail Wladimiroff said his ill-considered comments published earlier this month in Dutch and Bulgarian publications did not compromise his role as a ``friend of the court,'' and he should be allowed to continue. He has said he was misinterpreted and misquoted.
The three judges are to decide later whether to dismiss Wladimiroff, one of three veteran defense attorneys appointed last year to help ensure Milosevic gets a fair trial.
Milosevic, who refuses to recognize the legitimacy of the U.N. court, is acting as his own defense counsel. He had complained about the articles and challenged Wladimiroff's right to remain involved in the trial.

Wladimiroff said he regretted giving the interviews to the Dutch daily Haagse Courant and the Bulgarian magazine Kultura.
``I really should not have given the interviews and consequently I am responsible,'' he told the judges Thursday.

The Haagse Courant quoted him as saying: ``If his trial was only on Kosovo, and you weighed the evidence now, Milosevic would certainly be convicted.''
``There is a clear link between the police and the army, the massacres in Kosovo, and Milosevic,'' he was quoted as saying.

In hearings on Sept. 11, Wladimiroff told the court he had not authorized the article and didn't recall saying much of its contents. The quotes were ``a misrepresentation of what I have said ... I have certainly not said there is sufficient evidence to convict the accused.''
Wladimiroff said Thursday he was also misquoted by the Bulgarian magazine. When asked whether Milosevic stood a chance of being acquitted, the article quote Wladimiroff as saying: ``Theoretically yes, but in practice no.''

Judge Patrick Robinson said the question was not only whether Wladimiroff can continue impartially, but whether he is perceived as being neutral.

The three friends of the court, which also include British and Yugoslav attorneys, attend the trial daily to ensure Milosevic's rights are protected. They may point out mitigating evidence and cross-examine witnesses, but they cannot initiate his defense strategy.
Earlier Thursday, Milosevic finished cross-examining Croatian President Stipe Mesic, who began testifying Tuesday as a prosecution witness on the indictment of war crimes in Croatia and Bosnia, including genocide.

The two ex-Yugoslav presidents dueled in court, each blaming the other for the breakup of the former Yugoslavia and the 1991 events preceding the Balkan bloodletting.
Mesic had accused Milosevic of inciting Croatian Serbs to arms, to rebel against his republic's proclamation of independence, and manipulating the Yugoslav army to grab land in Croatia and Bosnia to create a ``Greater Serbia'' state, purged of non-Serbs.
``That was never the policy of any government of Serbia, any official or my presidency,'' Milosevic said. ``You are the one who was responsible for the conflict, you caused the killings, isn't that true?''

War crime trial considers making reporters testify

By Matt Daily

THE HAGUE, Oct 3 (Reuters) - A landmark test case on whether correspondents can be forced to testify at The Hague war crimes trials could end with no resolution, lawyers said on Thursday.

Former Washington Post correspondent Jonathan Randal has refused to testify for the prosecution, with his lawyers arguing it would endanger war correspondents and hamper their ability to cover the fighting.

Randal is supported by more than 30 organisations, including The New York Times, the BBC and some media in former Yugoslavia, who see the case as a potential landmark on journalists' rights.

Prosecutors wanted Randal to give evidence against Radoslav Brdjanin, a former Bosnian Serb deputy prime minister on trial for war crimes, and to confirm a story he wrote quoting Brdjanin as saying he wanted to get rid of the non-Serb population.
Brdjanin is charged with deporting, torturing and murdering Croats and Muslims during the 1992-95 Bosnia war.

A judge at the U.N. tribunal for former Yugoslavia in June ordered Randal to testify. Randal appealed the ruling, setting the stage for the test case.
Floyd Abrams, representing the media organisations, told the five-judge appellate panel on Thursday that journalists should be granted a limited privilege to gather information.
Prosecutors and Randal's attorneys said later the test case might fade away, with Brjdanin's lawyers shunning the court on Thursday and perhaps backing away from calls to question Randal.
Prosecutor Joanna Korner said if the veracity of the story was no longer in dispute ``we don't need to call Mr Randal'' as long as the article can be introduced as evidence.

JOURNALISTIC PRIVILEGE
Prosecutors argued Randal's case does not fit traditional journalist privilege because he was not protecting an anonymous source.
Other journalists have testified at the tribunal, including the BBC's former Belgrade correspondent Jacky Rowland, who faced off against ex-Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic in August.
Prosecutors subpoenaed Randal after Brdjanin's lawyers said a 1993 article had misquoted their client. Brdjanin's lawyers said they wanted to cross-examine Randal in court.

Prosecutors later submitted a written statement from Randal re-affirming the quotes and Brdjanin's attorneys dropped their request to question Randal on the article's veracity.
But the e-mail from Brdjanin's team indicated they may want to question Randal on alleged omissions of crucial context from his article, lawyers involved in the case said.
Brdjanin's lawyer, John Ackerman, will have to clarify his position about whether he would contest Randal's article before it was clear whether the test case would proceed, the lawyers said.

Iraq crisis looms over EU defense ministers talks on modernizing military

By PAUL AMES

RETHYMNO, Greece (AP) _ European Union defense ministers open talks Friday on the Greek island of Crete focussed on how to modernize their armed forces in response to the threat from international terrorism.
EU diplomats said ministers would find it hard to avoid talk on Iraq though the issue was not on the agenda. No substantive debate was expected on Europe's response to the crisis.
West European nations are under pressure to close a yawning gap in military capabilities with the United States.
''We must do better militarily,'' EU foreign and security chief Javier Solana told a conference of defense experts in Brussels Thursday.
''We need new military capabilities and must reflect (on how) to have more efficient capabilities in a shorter period of time.''
He suggested the EU and NATO nations share the work but complained that the respective military and civilian staffs of the two organizations are barred form having official contacts.
''As crucial deadlines are approaching fast, we cannot afford to waste more opportunities to fulfill our objectives, in particular avoiding a growing trans-Atlantic capability gap,'' said Solana.
He said also the West Europeans lacked a common understanding of the security threat from rogue nations.
''We have to begin to debate threats to our security,'' he told a security conference co-hosted by NATO and the Transatlantic Center of the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

EU officials said the defense ministers were unlikely have a nitty-gritty discussion of possible military support for any U.S.-led attack on Iraq.
The Europeans are divided on military action against Saddam Hussein. Germany and France have taken an anti-war line, while Britain, Italy and Spain broadly support an American-led attack against Iraq _ with or without formal backing from the United Nations security council.

On Wednesday, French President Jacques Chirac reiterated his opposition to a U.N. resolution making military intervention in Iraq automatic from the start. And German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder said his country remains fully opposed to intervention.
The high-tech U.S. strike on Afghanistan last fall underscored how far Europe has slipped behind American military power.

European governments have taken some steps to boost military spending this year.
Britain has announced defense spending would rise from 29.3 billion pounds ($45.7 billion) to 32.8 billion pounds ($51.2 billion) by 2005-06.
Stung by domestic criticism it was falling behind Britain, the French cabinet approved a 2003 budget that raises defense spending by about 1 billion euros ($980 million), including an 11.2 percent increase in credits for equipment for the armed forces over the next five years.

Even Germany, with its sluggish economy and strong anti-war sentiment, is laying out an extra 3.3 percent for defense next year.
The United States, which accounts for 60 percent of all NATO defense spending, is expected to adopt a $34.4 billion increase in defense outlays this year raising the military budget to $355.4 billion.

The EU's military weakness is most evident in its failure to forge a common defense force.
The EU is committed itself to put together a 60,000-strong rapid reaction force for Balkan-style peacekeeping purposes but cannot even take over a 800-strong international force in Macedonia because of a Greek-Turkish spat.
The Turks _ in NATO, but not the EU _ say they will only guarantee NATO backup to an EU force if it can veto any European military action in its neighborhood. Greece calls that unreasonable interference.

Blair and America's wars

The Guardian

Tony Blair's liberal interventionism may have a pedigree but not the one which Timothy Garton Ash tries to invent with a partial quotation of Gladstone's thundering denunciation of British reprisals against Afghan women and children in 1879 (Gambling on America, October 3).
Didn't Mr Garton Ash hear a contemporary echo in Gladstone's citation of newspaper reports "that from such and such a village attacks have been made on British forces, and that in consequence the village has been burned". Hasn't he heard how US gunships have made mincemeat of Afghan wedding parties for firing in the air?
From Kabul to Kosovo, Tony's wars have killed innocents, but Tony's peace blights whole societies. In Pristina, I am less struck than Garton Ash by the fading graffiti "Thank you Tony Bler", than by the lack of electricity and running water, and the crime and squalor throughout Kosovo. Most Albanians imagined the liberation rather differently. Three years on, thousands continue to flee. Yet Mr Blair offers the same for Iraq.

Some historians may see their task as flattering those in power (and are flattered by proximity to power - "To listen to him in a smaller group is to be convinced"), rather than unsettling our rulers with the harsh consequences of their triumphs. History has not been kind to the court historians of the past - will it be any more indulgent to apologists for the new world order?

Mark Almond
Oriel College, Oxford
· Tony Blair's impressive speech was strong on pro-Americanism but weak on US history. He was wrong to identify the unilateralist-dominated Republican administration with those Americans who helped liberate Europe from Nazism. On the US side, this was organised by an anti-fascist Democrat, Franklin Roosevelt, supported by the internationalist wing of the Republican party. For the Republican unilateralists, then misnamed "isolationists", Roosevelt's priority was dismissed as "FDR's war". Their priority was "Asia first" - to enable General MacArthur to return to the Philippines.
As a young US naval intelligence officer who arrived in Washington three weeks after Pearl Harbor, I was staggered to find unilateralist Republican congressmen and senators trying to "prove" that Roosevelt and Churchill had connived at the Japanese attack to enable the US to go to war in Europe, although they failed to explain Hitler's declaration of war on the US.

Andrew Roth
London
· Bill Clinton now adds his acknowledgement that Tony Blair was a key figure in bringing the Bush administration to work with the UN. But, ironically, Blair's persistent ambivalence about whether he will support the US, with or without a UN mandate, undermines the notion that he respects that body above his loyalty to the "special relationship". It is by no means certain Bush will receive domestic endorsement for his unilateralism, so Blair, with his high standing among in the US, may prove the crucial figure in providing an "international" figleaf for actions which destroy the credibility of the UN for good.

Shelagh Owen
Birkenhead
· Your uncritical adoration of Bill Clinton is astonishing. Every day, you publish detailed reports about the devastating corruption in corporate America - Enron, WorldCom etc. And who was president when those crimes were planned and committed? Without Clinton's negligent stewardship in the White House, the lax controls over corporate America would never have occurred and our pensions would be a lot fatter.

Tom Bower
London

Nobel Peace Prize winner selected -- but mum's the word

OSLO, Oct 3 (AFP) - The Nobel Committee said Thursday it had selected this year's winner of the Peace Prize, but the five committee members will tight-lipped about the laureate's name ahead of the official announcement on October 11.
Among those rumoured to be front-runners are Afghan President Hamid Karzai, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and former US president Jimmy Carter.

"The committee has agreed on a decision and it will be announced on October 11," the head of the Nobel Institute and an influential member of the committee, Geir Lundestad, said tersely.

While recent years have seen the prestigious prize go to clear favourites -- South Korean President Kim Dae-Jung in 2000 and the United Nations and its Secretary General Kofi Annan in 2001 -- this year there seems to be no obvious choice.

The panel chose this year's winner from a record 156 nominations.
Lundestad's brief comment was, as is the case every year, sufficiently vague to keep speculation rife.

Either the five members of the committee agreed on a winner or winners (up to three can win the prize), or they decided not to attribute the prize, or they chose to reserve it in order to award retroactively the following year.

Some observers speculated that in the wake of the September 11 attacks on the US, the committee, which is currently left-leaning, may have chosen to honour a Muslim known for his commitment to democracy, or an organisation that advocates multilateralism at a time when US unilateralism is under heavy criticism.

As a result, names circulating include Hamid Karzai, Malaysian jailed ex-deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim or imprisoned Egyptian-American human rights activist Saad Eddin Ibrahim.

Former US president Jimmy Carter, the UN war crimes tribunal or its prosecutor Carla del Ponte are also possible laureates.

But, the observers said, the committee could also choose to honour someone who has worked to reconcile religions, in which case Bartholomew Archbishop of Constantinople and the World Council of Churches have been mentioned as possible winners.
Meanwhile, in December, Lundestad said that "sooner or later, we will have to attack the China question."

Should the committee go down that route now, the mothers of the victims of the Tiananmen Square massacre could be honoured, or longstanding opposition leader Wei Jingsheng.
The winner of this year's Nobel Peace Prize will win a gold medal, a diploma and a cheque worth 10 million Swedish kronor (1.10 million euros/dollars).