Subject: YDS 8/22 From: ddc@nyquist.bellcore.com (D.D. Chukurov) 22. AUGUST 1995. YUGOSLAV DAILY SURVEY CONTENTS: YUGOSLAVIA- ROMANIA - ROMANIAN FOREIGN MINISTER ARRIVED IN BELGRADE YUGOSLAVIA - GREECE - MITSOTAKIS, MILUTINOVIC DISCUSS DEVELOPMENTS IN FORMER YUGOSLAVIA S A N C T I O N S - RUSSIAN ENVOY: IT IS TIME SANCTIONS AGAINST YUGOSLAVIA WERE LIFTED - LOSS: OVER 35 BILLION DOLLARS CROATIA - THE R.S.K. - SERB KRAJINA FOREIGN MINISTER, U.S. ZAGREB OFFICIALS CANCEL MEETING KRAJINA - ATROCITIES - SYSTEMATIC BURNING AND LOOTING OF SERB PROPERTY IN RSK CONTINUES - HELSINKI WATCH CRITICISES CROATIA FOR CRIMES IN KRAJINA - KRAJINA IN FLAMES BOSNIA - SERBS - BOSNIAN SERB PRESIDENT KARADZIC ON U.S. INITIATIVE - VERY SERIOUS HUMANITARIAN SITUATION IN BOSNIAN SERB REPUBLIC CROATIA - JASENOVAC - SURVIVORS DEMAND THAT CROATIAN WW II DEATH CAMP MEMORIAL BE SAVED FROM FOREIGN PRESS - LONDON ANALYSTS: ZAGREB IS CREATING DICTATORIAL AND ETHNICALLY PURE CROATIA - MALAYSIA TO DELIVER TURKISH ARMS TO BOSNIAN MUSLIMS YUGOSLAVIA- ROMANIA ROMANIAN FOREIGN MINISTER ARRIVED IN BELGRADE B e l g r a d e, Aug. 22 (Tanjug) - Romanian Foreign Minister Teodor Melescanu arrived on Tuesday for a one-day official visit to Belgrade at the invitation of Yugoslav Foreign Minister Milan Milutinovic. YUGOSLAVIA - GREECE MITSOTAKIS, MILUTINOVIC DISCUSS DEVELOPMENTS IN FORMER YUGOSLAVIA A t h e n s, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - Yugoslav Foreign Minister Milan Milutinovic met here on Monday with Honorary President of the Greek New Democracy Party Constantine Mitsotakis to discuss developments in the former Yugoslavia and the region. After the meeting with Milutinovic, who is former Yugoslav Ambassador to Greece, Mitsotakis told reporters that the Yugoslav crisis was at a critical point. He said that there were chances for a political solution but that a clear risk was involved as well. Mitsotakis expressed hope that a peaceful, political solution would be found for the former Yugoslavia, rather than one that would be imposed militarily. S A N C T I O N S IT IS TIME SANCTIONS AGAINST YUGOSLAVIA WERE LIFTED Moscow, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - Russian President Boris Yeltsin's Special Envoy Alexander Zotov said Monday that it was time that the international sanctions against Yugoslavia were lifted and that he would discuss the issue with Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic. 'I have an impression that it is time to talk seriously on lifting sanctions from Belgrade,' Zotov told a Russian ITAR-TASS News agency correspondent in Zagreb. LOSS: OVER 35 BILLION DOLLARS M o s c o w, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - U.N. sanctions against Yugoslavia have cost that country in excess of 35 billion dollars, and their enforcement has been costing Russia about five billion dollars a year, the two country's joint economic committee said on Monday. The Russian-Yugoslav Committee for Economic, Scientific and Technical Cooperation opened its first session in Moscow on Monday. The delegations are headed by Russian First Deputy Economy Minister Andrei Shapovlyants and Yugoslav Minister of Trade Djordje Siradovic, respectively. Meeting the press after the session, both sides said that the anti-Yugoslav sanctions should be lifted because Belgrade has met all the requirements for their lifting. CROATIA - THE R.S.K. KRAJINA FOREIGN MINISTER, U.S. ZAGREB OFFICIALS CANCEL MEETING B e l g r a d e, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - A meeting between Serb Krajina Foreign Minister Milivoj Vojinovic and U.S. Embassy in Zagreb officials, which was to be held in Vukovar on Monday, was cancelled because of the problems for the U.S. delegation to reach the venue. According to a statement released by the Serb Krajina Foreign Ministry press office, the meeting should have focused on the protection of the remaining Serbs and their property in the Western Serb Krajina, which was invaded by the Croatian army in early August. The statement said that the meeting, initiated by Serb Krajina, should also have discussed the possibilities of the U.S. Embassy in Zagreb mediation in preventing the escalation of the war. It said the meeting should have focused also on opening possibilities of resuming the negotiating process for a peaceful solution to Serb Krajina-Croatia relations. The U.S. Embassy in Belgrade informed the Serb Krajina office that the meeting could not be held because of the problems for the U.S. delegation to reach the Eastern Serb Krajina town of Vukovar. KRAJINA - ATROCITIES SYSTEMATIC BURNING AND LOOTING OF SERB PROPERTY CONTINUES Z a g r e b, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - U.N. spokesman Christopher Gunnes said at a press conference on Monday in Zagreb that a large number of Serb houses in villages in the Republic of Serb Krajina had been intentionally burned or mined. Heavy damages were caused in the villages of Staric, Dugo Selo and Stipan in the Kordun area, many villages along the Dvor-Glina road, in the sector North, and several villages near Knin in the sector South. Smoke is still rising from some burned houses even though 16 days have passed since Croatia's attack on RSK, which proves that burning and looting continues. HELSINKI WATCH CRITICISES CROATIA FOR CRIMES (by Goran Bradic) V i e n n a, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - Representatives of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) on Monday suggested to the International Tribunal for War Crimes in the Hague to tackle the situation in the Republic of Serb Krajina following Croatian army aggression. At a press conference in Vienna, IHF Representatives presented serious charges against Croatian government and army for the latter's behaviour in RSK, and said that there were several mass graves of Serbs in that region. The IHF delegation, which visited Krajina from August 17 to 19, observed one such grave in Knin and counted 86 crosses, some of which were unmarked. U.N. representatives suppose that there are three more mass graves of killed Serbs in Knin and others in the nearby hills. It is also supposed that many bodies were burned, they said. Croatian authorities in Krajina claim that burials were performed in the presence of representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross, but ICRC denies this. IHF activists pointed out that Croatian authorities had said they could not guarantee safety to Serb refugees returning home. Some Serb civilians did return to their homes, but were beaten by Croats and had to seek shelter again in U.N. bases, they said. The situation is somewhat better in the Northern part of RSK, but even there only 1,000 Serbs remain out of the 100,000 who used to live there before Croatia's aggression, IHF representatives said. Refugees and U.N. representatives in Knin speak of many murders and bodies they have seen, and many people are reported missing. Croatian authorities however deny such reports. Nevertheless, even Croatian Commander in Knin General Ivan Cermak did not rule out the possibility that bodies of another 200 or 300 people shot in the head could be found near Knin and in surrounding hills. Some displaced Serbs are believed to be still hiding in the woods, and Croatian army has announced mopping-up operations, IHF representatives said. Bureaucratic measures are also used to prevent the return of those refugees who would dare go back to Krajina. Croatia's office in Belgrade refuses to issue documents to the expelled Serbs, and the Zagreb government is accelerating constitution changes in order to reduce the protection of minorities even more, IHF representatives told the press in Vienna. KRAJINA IN FLAMES B e l g r a d e, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - A journey through the Republic of Serb Krajina is a journey through hell, according to the Slovenian magazine Republika of Ljubljana whose reporter has been among the rare few to make his way to Krajina's administrative center of Knin. Describing his journey to Knin, the Ljubljana weekly's reporter said all of Krajina was in flames but fire was set only to Serb houses. He said that, going through ten or so torched villages, he saw evidence of atrocities committed by Croatia's troops. The reporter told about the tragic fate met by Laza Damjanic, a 65-year-old Serb who had remained in the village of Vrbnik. He did not flee before Croatia's troops because he had to look after his ailing wife, a disabled son and a deaf-mute elder sister. Croatia's troops burst into Laza's house on Aug. 6, took him out and killed him by slitting his throat a hundred meters away. There was nobody to bury him. And while Krajina is in flames, Tudjman is cynically making peace pronouncements and allegedly guaranteeing Krajina Serbs all rights and physical protection. Krajina is at last silent and ethnically completely pure, the Ljubljana Republika said. BOSNIA - SERBS KARADZIC ON U.S. INITIATIVE B e l g r a d e, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic said on Monday that the U.S. initiative for Bosnia could work only if it recognised the fact that the Bosnian Serbs were defending their lands, and if it allowed them linkage with Serbia. In an interview for Bosnian Serb television, quoted by the Bosnian Serb news agency Srna, Karadzic said that the efforts of the international community to preserve Bosnia-Herzegovina as a union could be considered. However, he said, there could be no question of denying the Serbs full sovereignty on the basis of which they should decide their own fate. Karadzic said that the international community was trying to push the Bosnian Serb Republic out of the peace talks, but stressed that nobody could negotiate in their name, because the Bosnian Serb leadership was accountable to the assembly and the people. He was optimistic, however, saying there were some encouraging signs that the war might end soon. VERY SERIOUS HUMANITARIAN SITUATION B a n j a l u k a, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - The humanitarian situation in Bosnian Serb Republic is very serious, especially in its Western part where nearly 100,000 Serbs expelled from the Republic of Serb Krajina, as well as refugees from various parts of the Bosnian Serb Republic are temporarily accommodated. Bosnian Serb Republic Commission for Refugees official Slobodan Ecimovic said that due to the unexpectedly large number of refugees from RSK, of whom nearly 70,000 are held up in the areas of Petrovac, Banjaluka and Doboj, the modest stocks of humanitarian aid provided by local and international organizations were depleted quickly, and that fresh aid was insufficient by far to cover the needs. In addition to food and the basic items for survival of such a large number of homeless, the most severe shortage is felt as regards construction materials for housing repairs to provide more permanent accommodation to the displaced, Ecimovic said. CROATIA - JASENOVAC SURVIVORS DEMAND THAT CROATIAN WW II DEATH CAMP MEMORIAL BE SAVED B e l g r a d e, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - Survivors of the Croatian World War II Jasenovac death camp appealed on Monday for preventing the Zagreb regime from obliterating all trace of a children's death camp in Gornja Reka near Krizevci. The children's death camp was opened in the old castle in Gornja Reka within the Jasenovac camp complex on July 12, 1942, on the orders of ustasha (croatian fascist) leader Ante Pavelic. It held in its cells more than 400 Serb children, about 200 of whom perished and were buried behind its walls. Croatian authorities are planning a restoration of the castle which the survivors fear will obliterate all evidence of the camp. 'The planned restoration of the castle has disturbed us - the surviving cousins and siblings of the children who perished at the hands of the croatian regime,' said the appeal, addressed to the United Nations and the world as a whole. The former inmates insist that all evidence and documents about the extermination of Serb children should be duly registered and filed and their remains buried in properly marked graves. More than 700,000 Serbs, Jews and Gypsies perished at the hands of Croatian fascists in the Jasenovac death camp alone, which was the biggest in the Balkans and the third biggest in occupied europe. Tens of thousands of children were incarcerated within its walls. A yugoslav historian has collected extensive evidence, with full names of the children, to prove that about 14,000 Serb children from the Mt. Kozara area in northwestern Bosnia alone died at Jasenovac. The current Croatian Government and especially President Franjo Tudjman are trying to minimize the number of the Jasenovac victims, putting the figure at no more than 30,000. FROM FOREIGN PRESS ZAGREB IS CREATING DICTATORIAL AND ETHNICALLY PURE CROATIA L o n d o n, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - British analysts are increasingly frequently pointing out that the Zagreb authorities are creating a dictatorial and ethnically pure Croatian state. The London Guardian underlines Monday that following the expulsion of Serbs from Krajina, only three percent of non Croats will remain in the country, out of the former 22 percent. The paper writes quoting unidentified sources that the same fate lies in store for Muslims in Croatia and that Muslim refugees from Bosnia-Herzegovina will be the first to face expulsion. The Zagreb authorities are building a 'monolithic order' in the country on the basis of national consolidation, which will take that former Yugoslav republic on a path away from desired integration with the West and the proclaimed democracy, the Independent writes. MALAYSIA TO DELIVER TURKISH ARMS TO BOSNIAN MUSLIMS A n k a r a, Aug. 21 (Tanjug) - Malaysia plans, in cooperation with Turkey, to start sending up-to-date weapons to Bosnian Muslims in the near future. Malaysia has recently unilaterally exempted Bosnian Muslims from the U.N. arms embargo, imposed on the entire territory of the former Yugoslavia in September 1991, and is now trying to involve Ankara in this, the Turkish daily Milliyet said Monday. The daily said that Malaysian Army Chief-of-Staff Ismail Omar has recently visited Ankara and discussed with his hosts the purchase of Turkish arms, which would be transported to Bosnian Muslims in Turkish ships. The shipments would allegedly be transported under Malaysian flag. The daily quoted unnamed high-ranking Turkish sources as saying Turkey had a benevolent stand toward this Malaysian initiative. Another Malaysian delegation is due in Ankara soon to confer with Turkish officials about the details of arms shipments. In the face of the U.N. arms embargo, Turkey has so far been sending arms to Bosnian Muslims, which has recently been confirmed also by Turkish army former Chief-of-Staff Duresh Gurkan. =============================================================== -- I speak for no one and no one speaks for me -- D. D. Chukurov ddc@nyquist.bellcore.com ===============================================================