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RFE/RL Newsline, Vol. 4, No. 157, 00-08-16

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Newsline Directory - Previous Article - Next Article

From: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty <http://www.rferl.org>

RFE/RL NEWSLINE

Vol. 4, No. 157, 16 August 2000


CONTENTS

[A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

  • [01] ARMENIAN INVESTMENT FORUM AGAIN POSTPONED
  • [02] AZERBAIJAN DENIES SUPPORTING IRANIAN
  • [03] DOCTORS SAY FORMER AZERBAIJANI PRESIDENT TOO ILL
  • [04] JOURNALISTS' WATCHDOG URGES AZERBAIJAN TO DROP
  • [05] ABKHAZ POLITICIAN SHOT DEAD
  • [06] EXPLOSION AT GEORGIAN ISOTOPES INSTITUTE KILLS
  • [07] NEW CHARGES OF DISCRIMINATION AT KAZAKH OIL
  • [08] KAZAKH, UZBEK PRESIDENTS SEEK TO EXPEDITE LEGAL
  • [09] AIDE TO KYRGYZ OPPOSITION LEADER RELEASED
  • [10] KYRGYZ PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE FAILS LANGUAGE
  • [11] KYRGYZ TROOPS FREE GERMAN HOSTAGES
  • [12] TAJIK PRESIDENT BEGINS VACATION, UZBEK PRESIDENT

  • [B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

  • [13] SERBIAN OPPOSITION UNVEILS ELECTION PROGRAM...
  • [14] ...PLANS DEBT PROGRAM...
  • [15] ...CRITICIZES MONTENEGRIN BOYCOTT OF YUGOSLAV
  • [16] SERBIAN STUDENT MOVEMENT APPEALS FOR UNITY
  • [17] SERBIAN REGIME CONTINUES PRE-ELECTION SHOW
  • [18] ...AND OF STUDENT ACTIVISTS
  • [19] ANGRY SERBS PROTEST KOSOVA MINE TAKEOVER...
  • [20] ...AS KOUCHNER REASSURES SERBS
  • [21] DUTCH AMBASSADOR TO UN: CORRUPTION STILL
  • [22] ....BUT OTHERS SEE PROGRESS
  • [23] ANOTHER ROMANIAN PEASANT PARTY OFFICIAL
  • [24] ROMANIAN PREMIER PROMISES FIRM HAND IN LEADING
  • [25] TRANSDNIESTER PUBLIC ORGANIZATIONS ACCUSE
  • [26] BULGARIAN, U.S. INTELLIGENCE CHIEFS AGREE TO

  • [C] END NOTE

  • [27] COMING TO TERMS WITH THE PAST

  • [A] TRANSCAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA

    [01] ARMENIAN INVESTMENT FORUM AGAIN POSTPONED

    A

    major Armenian international business forum planned to be held

    in London this fall has been postponed, the World Bank's

    resident representative in Armenia, Oweis Saadat, told RFE/RL's

    Yerevan bureau on 15 August. Saadat said the meeting,

    originally scheduled for May 2000, will probably take place in

    New York early next year. He denied that the change of venue

    was motivated by political considerations. LF

    [02] AZERBAIJAN DENIES SUPPORTING IRANIAN

    'SEPARATISTS'

    Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Vilayat Guliev on

    15 August denied that Baku supports or aids separatists in Iran

    or that such separatists enter Iranian territory from Azerbaijan,

    according to ANS courtesy of Groong. He noted that both

    Iranian and Azerbaijani border guards are deployed along the

    frontier between the two countries. Major General Abbasali

    Novruzov, the commander of Azerbaijan's Border Guards,

    similarly told ANS that his service has received no reports or

    claims of illegal crossings by Iranian separatists into Iran from

    Azerbaijani territory. But Novruzov admitted that owing to the

    dilapidated state of border installations, it would not be difficult

    to cross undetected. In recent weeks, Azerbaijani media have

    quoted Iranian spiritual leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as

    accusing Azerbaijan of supporting separatists and interfering in

    Iran's internal affairs. Iranian reports of Khamenei's speeches

    carry no such references, however. LF

    [03] DOCTORS SAY FORMER AZERBAIJANI PRESIDENT TOO ILL

    TO UNDERGO SURGERY

    Turkish doctors treating former

    President and Azerbaijan Popular Front (AHCP) chairman

    Abulfaz Elchibey at the Gulhane military hospital in Ankara have

    confirmed that he is suffering from prostate cancer, AFP

    reported on 15 August quoting Azertadj. They said he is

    undergoing radiation treatment, as it is too late to treat the

    cancer by surgery. Senior members of the AHCP have

    repeatedly denied that Elchibey is suffering from cancer (see

    "RFE/RL Newsline," 7 August 2000). LF

    [04] JOURNALISTS' WATCHDOG URGES AZERBAIJAN TO DROP

    CASE AGAINST NEWSPAPER

    Reporters Sans Frontieres has

    written to Azerbaijani Information Minister Siruz Tebrizli asking

    him to drop the court case he brought against the independent

    newspaper "Uch Nogte," Turan reported on 15 August. The

    court case is due to begin on 16 August. Tebrizli is demanding

    the newspaper's closure, citing an article of the press law that

    provides for the closure of print media that are sued three times

    within 12 months for publishing incorrect information. Turan

    quoted Reporters Sans Frontieres Secretary-General Robert

    Menard as saying that there are no grounds for the closure of

    "Uch Nogte," which, he said, "would be a direct attempt to

    hamper press freedom" in Azerbaijan. LF

    [05] ABKHAZ POLITICIAN SHOT DEAD

    Zurab Achba, a

    consultant to the OSCE Human Rights office in Sukhum and

    former Abkhaz parliamentary deputy, was gunned down from a

    passing car late on 15 August in Sukhum, Caucasus Press

    reported. A local administration official in the village of Okumi in

    Abkhazia's Tkvarcheli Raion was killed during the night of 13-14

    August. LF

    [06] EXPLOSION AT GEORGIAN ISOTOPES INSTITUTE KILLS

    ONE

    A staff member at the Institute of Isotopes in Tbilisi was

    killed by an explosion late on 15 August, Caucasus Press and

    Interfax reported. Georgian officials say no radioactivity was

    released. The blast is believed to have been caused when a

    bottle of nitrogen exploded during an experiment. LF

    [07] NEW CHARGES OF DISCRIMINATION AT KAZAKH OIL

    COMPANY

    The Chinese management of the Aqtobemunaigaz

    oil company is violating the rights of the enterprise's Kazakh

    employees by granting unspecified privileges to Chinese workers

    who are not covered by Kazakhstan's labor laws, Interfax

    reported on 15 August, quoting an official from the Aqtobe

    Oblast prosecutor's office. An investigation conducted by that

    office determined that Kazakh employees of Aqtobemunaigaz

    are being paid 75 percent less than their Kazakh colleagues for

    performing the same duties. An earlier dispute between the

    Kazakh government and the Chinese National Oil Company,

    which owns a 60 percent stake in Aqtobemunaigaz, was

    resolved in April (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 2 March and 27 April

    2000). LF

    [08] KAZAKH, UZBEK PRESIDENTS SEEK TO EXPEDITE LEGAL

    REFORM

    Addressing prominent lawyers in Astana on 14

    August, Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbaev instructed

    them to prepare amendments to the bill "On the Courts and the

    Status of Judges," Interfax reported. That law is intended to

    strengthen the independence of the judiciary from the

    executive. In Tashkent. Uzbek President Islam Karimov issued a

    decree similarly intended to make the country's legal system

    more democratic, Interfax reported. The decree will ensure the

    prompt conduct of trials and increase the legal protection of

    individual, political, social and economic rights and freedoms,

    according to the presidential press service. Meanwhile, Amnesty

    International on 15 August issued an appeal on behalf of four

    young Uzbek men whose appeals against the death sentences

    handed down to them by a Samarkand court for separate

    murders have been rejected. LF

    [09] AIDE TO KYRGYZ OPPOSITION LEADER RELEASED

    Emil

    Aliev, who headed opposition Ar-Namys party chairman Feliks

    Kulov's election campaign earlier this year, was released from

    detention in Bishkek on 15 August because of his deteriorating

    health, RFE/RL's bureau in the Kyrgyz capital reported. He had

    been detained shortly after the second round of voting in early

    March on suspicion of embezzlement (see "RFE/RL Newsline,"

    10 March 2000). LF

    [10] KYRGYZ PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE FAILS LANGUAGE

    TEST

    The linguistic commission of Kyrgyzstan's Central

    Electoral Commission ruled on 15 August that Party of

    Communists of Kyrgyzstan presidential candidate Iskhak

    Masaliev failed the mandatory tests in written and spoken

    Kyrgyz, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported. Masaliev, who is a

    parliamentary deputy. said he intends to appeal that decision.

    Also on 15 August, parliamentary deputy Ishenbai Kadyrbekov

    announced his intention to contest the presidential poll, raising

    the number of declared or anticipated candidates to 17. LF

    [11] KYRGYZ TROOPS FREE GERMAN HOSTAGES

    During their

    reportedly successful operation to drive the Islamist militants

    back to the Tajik border, Kyrgyz government troops on 15

    August released eight German mountaineers taken hostage by

    the Islamists four days earlier. None of the German climbers had

    been harmed. In Bishkek, General Bolot Djanuzakov, who is

    Kyrgyz Security Council secretary, claimed on 15 August that

    the Islamists have at their disposal combat aircraft supplied by

    Afghanistan's Taliban, according to Interfax. Speaking in

    Dushanbe on 15 August, Tajik Security Council Deputy

    Secretary Nuralisho Nazarov rejected Djanuzakov's claim that

    500-700 fighters are gathered in the Karategin valley on the

    Tajik side of the Tajik-Kyrgyz border ready to enter Kyrgyzstan,

    Asia Plus-Blitz reported. Nazarov also denied reports that former

    United Tajik Opposition fighters who have now joined the

    country's armed forces are aiding the Islamists. LF

    [12] TAJIK PRESIDENT BEGINS VACATION, UZBEK PRESIDENT

    TO STAY HOME

    Tajikistan's President Imomali Rakhmonov is

    currently on a short vacation in Sochi, where he met with

    Russian President Vladimir Putin on 16 August, Asia Plus-Blitz

    reported. Meanwhile, a spokesman for Uzbek President Karimov

    told ITAR-TASS on 15 August that owing to the worsening

    situation on the Uzbek-Tajik border, Karimov will not attend the

    informal 18-19 August CIS summit in Yalta. LF


    [B] SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

    [13] SERBIAN OPPOSITION UNVEILS ELECTION PROGRAM...

    Democratic Party leader Zoran Djindjic told a news conference

    in Belgrade on 15 August that the united opposition has drawn

    up its "contract between future [legislative] deputies and the

    electorate," Reuters reported. The program calls on the new

    parliament to pass on its first day a series of resolutions aimed

    at repealing Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's recent

    constitutional changes and measures to curb media freedoms.

    The resolutions also include measures to end sanctions against

    Montenegro and implement UN Security Council Resolution 1244

    in Kosova, as well as to reform the police, military, and judiciary.

    The program stresses that "we oblige ourselves to renew

    popular confidence in the state, root out corruption in public

    institutions, and together embrace comprehensive reforms so

    that Serbia can return to its rightful place in the community of

    European states." The program calls on the legislature to bring

    Serbian law into harmony with European standards within 100

    days and institute a program of economic legislation, including

    currency and taxation reforms. PM

    [14] ...PLANS DEBT PROGRAM...

    Mladjan Dinkic of the G-17

    opposition group of economists told the Belgrade press

    conference on 15 August that the government hopes to cover

    a planned deficit through $500 million in direct donations from

    the West, $350 million in foreign direct investment, and $150

    million from short-term borrowing abroad, Reuters reported. It is

    not clear whether the opposition has already approached foreign

    governments, investors, or banks with its ideas. PM

    [15] ...CRITICIZES MONTENEGRIN BOYCOTT OF YUGOSLAV

    ELECTIONS

    Opposition presidential candidate Vojislav

    Kostunica told the 15 August Belgrade press conference that

    the program is "an effort to establish dialogue within Serbia and

    between Serbia and the outside world so that Serbia can set up

    democratic institutions," Reuters reported. Earlier in the day, he

    criticized the Montenegrin leadership's decision to boycott the

    federal ballot, saying that the Podgorica leadership had, in

    effect, "voted for Milosevic" by denying his opponents

    Montenegrin votes. Meanwhile in Podgorica, President Milo

    Djukanovic said that the Montenegrin authorities will not

    obstruct the holding of the elections on Montenegrin territory,

    RFE/RL's South Slavic Service reported. PM

    [16] SERBIAN STUDENT MOVEMENT APPEALS FOR UNITY

    Leaders of the Otpor (Resistance) student movement told a

    press conference in Belgrade on 15 August that the most

    important task facing all Serbs is to unite to defeat Milosevic,

    "Vesti" reported. PM

    [17] SERBIAN REGIME CONTINUES PRE-ELECTION SHOW

    TRIALS OF FOREIGNERS...

    The trial of Slovenian citizens Milos

    Glisovic and his wife, Natasa Zorz, began in Belgrade on 16

    August. The Yugoslav military have accused them of

    "unauthorized entry into military facilities and making sketches

    and drawings of military facilities and combat material," AP

    reported (see "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 8 August 2000). On 15

    August, Dutch Charge d'affaires Kees Klompenhouwer told

    reporters that he had spoken to the four Dutch citizens held in

    Serbia for allegedly plotting to kill Milosevic (see "RFE/RL

    Newsline," 15 August 2000). Klompenhouwer said that "the

    detainees were very glad to see us; it's for the first time in

    almost four weeks that they had the opportunity to talk to

    someone from their own country. They have been going

    through a very difficult time." He added that the men are doing

    "reasonably well" but that their medical condition needs "closer

    attention." PM

    [18] ...AND OF STUDENT ACTIVISTS

    Serbian authorities on 15

    August charged three Otpor activists in the Vojvodina town of

    Indija with "spreading false information," Reuters reported. One

    of the students told reporters that "we have no idea what

    we've been accused of doing." He added, however, that the

    charges are probably linked to Otpor's attempt to hold a

    benefit concert in Indija recently. Police arrested a total of five

    additional Otpor activists in two other Serbian towns on 15

    August. PM

    [19] ANGRY SERBS PROTEST KOSOVA MINE TAKEOVER...

    Some

    1,500 Serbs gathered on 16 August for the second day outside

    the Trepca mine complex, which UN peacekeepers have

    occupied to end environmental pollution from the smelter (see

    "RFE/RL Newsline," 15 August 2000). Milan Ivanovic, who is

    spokesman for the Serbs, told AP that "the takeover of Trepca

    is just part of the strategy by [UN chief administrator Bernard]

    Kouchner and the Albanians to ethnically cleanse Kosovo [of its

    remaining Serbs]. We will not allow the Albanians in. All those

    who worked here must continue to work." Many in the crowd

    work at Trepca and fear they will lose their jobs in a province

    with a high unemployment rate. Ivanovic added that local Serbs

    may decide to "set up an autonomous canton" in the area if

    they feel that their basic interests are threatened. Ethnic

    Albanians reject the idea of autonomous Serbian cantons, which

    they fear will be the first step toward the partition of the

    province. PM

    [20] ...AS KOUCHNER REASSURES SERBS

    Speaking at the Trepca

    complex on 16 August, Kouchner said that ending

    environmental pollution at the complex is in everyone's interest.

    "This [Serbian] community will have to understand that we will

    work for the benefit of all Kosovo and Serbs as well. We are

    acting in the interests of the Serbs," AP reported. Kouchner

    stressed that "it was impossible to tolerate this pollution,

    because of...the very high level of lead.... I don't know how long

    it will take us to...[have] this place running, months perhaps.

    This place is in desperate state, this is like the nineteenth

    century." PM

    [21] DUTCH AMBASSADOR TO UN: CORRUPTION STILL

    WIDESPEAD IN BOSNIA...

    Dutch Ambassador to the UN Peter

    van Walsum told the Security Council on 15 August that "it has

    been estimated that every year $500 million of domestic

    revenue is lost [in Bosnia] due to smuggling, particularly of

    cigarettes. Without this loss of revenue, there would be no

    budget deficit. Smuggling on such a huge scale implies that

    high level government officials must be involved," Reuters

    reported. He stressed that "it has been pointed out that the

    country is going through many simultaneous transitions. We

    grant this, but the conclusion can only be that the Bosnian

    authorities must redouble their efforts to stamp out crime and

    corruption. They must be aware that foreign aid is not an

    infinite commodity," an RFE/RL correspondent reported (see

    "RFE/RL Newsline," 11 July 2000). PM

    [22] ....BUT OTHERS SEE PROGRESS

    Bosnian UN Ambassador

    Muhamed Sacirbey told the Security Council on 15 August that

    no good will come of stressing the problems facing Bosnia

    rather than the progress it has made. "We've heard all the

    stories of corruption, we've heard all the stories of things not

    going the right way in Bosnia, [some of which is obviously]

    deserved and some...is not. But the real question is who is going

    to make investments in Bosnia if it is somehow set out as this

    no-man's land in a new Europe," Sacirbey argued. UN

    Undersecretary-General for Peacekeeping Bernard Miyet told the

    Security Council that "it can be noted that UNMIBH--UN Mission

    in Bosnia-Herzegovina--continues to move ahead in the

    implementation of its mandate in a positive fashion. There has

    been progress in all areas such as in inter-entity law

    enforcement arrangements and growing day-to-day cooperation

    between the Interior Ministries of the Bosnian Federation and of

    the Republika Srpska," an RFE/RL correspondent reported. PM

    [23] ANOTHER ROMANIAN PEASANT PARTY OFFICIAL

    DISMISSED

    Prime Minister Mugur Isarescu dismissed Financial

    Ministry Secretary of State Iosefina Morosan on 15 August,

    Romanian media reported the next day. The government offered

    no reason for the dismissal, while Morosan said she believes she

    was dismissed for political reasons. She was replaced by

    Romanian National Bank chief economist Valentin Lazea, who

    occupied that Financial Ministry post from 1997 to 1998.

    Isarescu's decision comes one day after he sacked another

    National Peasant Party Christian Democratic member,

    Environment Ministry Secretary of State Anton Vlad.

    Government counselor Adrian Vasilescu said the fact that both

    officials are members of the main coalition party is "a

    coincidence." ZsM

    [24] ROMANIAN PREMIER PROMISES FIRM HAND IN LEADING

    GOVERNMENT

    In an interview with Mediafax news agency on

    15 August, Premier Isarescu urged cabinet members to

    continue working as a team and put aside political disputes.

    Isarescu warned that if political rows surface, "firm measures"

    to maintain balance in the government will be introduced. He

    admitted to failing to reach the proposed targeted of a 27

    percent inflation rate for 2000 but added that the country's

    economic growth is "a certainty," the unemployment rate is

    decreasing, and the foreign deficit is still within projected limits.

    Isarescu said he is in "no hurry" to announce whether he will be

    a candidate in the presidential elections. ZsM

    [25] TRANSDNIESTER PUBLIC ORGANIZATIONS ACCUSE

    MOLDOVA OF DUPLICITY

    A group of unions and other public

    organizations in the breakaway Transdniester region have sent

    an appeal to Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and Defense

    Minister Igor Sergeev accusing the Moldovan government of

    duplicity and of seeking to eliminate Russia's political and

    military presence in the region, Infotag reported on 15 August.

    The appeal added that Moldova had sought to use the just-

    concluded peacekeeping maneuvers with Russia to mislead the

    Russian leadership. PG

    [26] BULGARIAN, U.S. INTELLIGENCE CHIEFS AGREE TO

    COOPERATE

    Visiting CIA director George Tenet told Dimo

    Gyaurov, the head of Bulgaria's Intelligence Service, that the

    two have "a community of interests," AP reported on 15

    August. An official statement released after their meeting said

    that "Bulgaria's position towards the Kosovo crisis and its

    behavior...during the [Kosovo] events in the spring last year

    were marked with gratitude at the meetings." The two sides

    said that they look forward to working together in the future.

    PG


    [C] END NOTE

    [27] COMING TO TERMS WITH THE PAST

    By Paul Goble

    Vladimir Putin's meeting with former Soviet President

    Mikhail Gorbachev and the Russian Orthodox Church's

    canonization of the last tsar are part of a new effort by

    Russians to confront their country's often complicated history.

    But reaction to both of these events highlights just how long

    and difficult that process is likely to be.

    President Putin received his Soviet-era predecessor for two

    hours on 10 August. Gorbachev, long shunned by Putin's

    predecessor, Boris Yeltsin, returned the compliment by

    observing that he has seen "a change for the better" since

    Putin became president. Moreover, he praised the current

    occupant of the Kremlin for what Gorbachev said is Putin's

    "democratic" approach to the media.

    Four days later, on 14 August, the Council of Bishops of

    the Russian Orthodox Church canonized Nicholas II and his

    family, who were murdered by the Bolsheviks on 17 July 1918.

    The Church body justified its action by saying that "in the last

    Russian Orthodox monarch and his family, we see people who

    sincerely tried to carry out the commandments of the Gospels

    in their lives."

    Both of these developments is clearly the product of a

    careful political calculation, one that balances the benefit such

    moves can give to their authors with the risks that each of

    these steps so obviously poses.

    By reaching out to Gorbachev, Putin has opened the way

    for a reconsideration of the last years of Soviet power, a period

    that many in Russia look back to with nostalgia but one whose

    major developments Yeltsin had either sharply criticized or

    attempted to pass over in silence. At the same time, the

    current Russian president's meeting with Gorbachev has

    angered those who dislike the last Soviet leader or who fear a

    return to a Soviet-style past.

    By canonizing the last Russian tsar, the Russian Orthodox

    Church in Moscow has extended a hand to the Russian Orthodox

    Church Abroad, a group that broke with the patriarchal Church

    over the latter's loyalty to the regime that had killed the

    imperial family. The canonization decision, however, is likely to

    infuriate those who were encouraged to view the last tsar as

    "Bloody Nicholas."

    But behind these specific calculations is a more general

    shift in the way Russia and its leaders have chosen to deal with

    the past. After the 1917 revolution, Soviet leaders initially

    attempted with remarkable success to ignore or simply

    denounce much of Russia's past only to see elements of that

    past re-emerge in various ways over the following decades. And

    again, after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian

    leaders in general and Yeltsin in particular sought to ignore or

    denounce the Soviet past and especially the Gorbachev period--

    with the parallel result that many of the elements of that period

    have continued to play a role in post-Soviet Russia.

    In both cases, the earlier unwillingness of many Russians

    to openly confront the past and thus to assimilate it into the

    national conciousness has had the unintended effect of making

    the past more, rather than less, influential. Consequently, this

    latest effort in Moscow to address the past appears to offer

    some promise that Russia may have begun to escape from this

    particular historical syndrome.

    But the historical experience of both Russia and other

    countries suggests that such a shift in perspective is likely to

    be both long and painful, not least because it will almost

    certainly be misread and opposed by people accustomed to

    denying the past. Some will see it as a signal that Putin and the

    Church have launched a concerted effort to turn back the

    clock, and others will conclude that both are maligning the

    intervening periods.

    Moreover, the obviousness of the current political

    calculations behind this shift in perspective almost always has

    the effect of further politicizing the past, thus making its

    interpretation and integration into the national consciousness

    more problematic rather than less difficult.

    And finally, decisions like those made by Putin and by the

    Russian Orthodox Church almost certainly will not be assimilated

    by everyone in Russia quickly or even at all, thus opening the

    door to new divisions even as those who took these decisions

    seek to overcome old ones.

    But these two steps, as different as they appear to be and

    in fact are, suggest that Russia and Russians are increasingly

    prepared to examine their pasts with equanimity, an approach

    that may have the unexpected effect of limiting the impact of

    those pasts on their future.

    16-08-00


    Reprinted with permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
    URL: http://www.rferl.org


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