Kostunica: normal contacts with political opponents

BELGRADE, Friday -- Yugoslav President-Elect Vojislav Kostunica said tonight that he had spoken to Slobodan Milosevic and the leadership of the Yugoslav Army and that there was now no further need for citizens to be concerned.

Speaking on state television, Kostunica said that it was important for the nation to become accustomed to transitions of power and that those transitions should be peaceful and without tension. He added that he had had appropriate contacts with the army and Milosevic and that he expected more such contacts would occur.

Other normal contacts with political opponents had already been happening, said the new president, mentioning particularly Radical Party leader Vojislav Seselj.

Kostunica said that the army must be depoliticised and that the new authorities would have to take care of the army, which he described as an important institution which was in a difficult position.

New elections for the Federal Parliament were necessary, said Kostunica, as was the drafting of a new Yugoslav Constitution which would preserve the country's borders, bring the partitioning of the territory to a halt and establish more sovereignty on that part of Yugoslavia's territory which was now only nominally under Yugoslav sovereignty.

Source: B92

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