Protests in Serbia Archive
Odraz B92 Daily News Service

---

    ------------------------------------------------------------------
    ODRAZ B92, Belgrade                             Daily News Service

    Odraz B92 vesti (by 10 PM), March 6, 1997

    E-mail: odrazb92@b92.opennet.org, beograd@siicom.com
    WWW:    http://www.siicom.com/odrazb/, http://www.opennet.org/b92/
    ------------------------------------------------------------------
    All texts are Copyright 1997 Radio B92. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
    ------------------------------------------------------------------



    NEWS BY 10 PM
    ------------------------------------------------------------------


    RTS CANCELS LEASE OF TRANSMITTER FACILITIES TO BK TELECOM

    Radio Television Serbia (RTS) sent an official note to BK
    Television on Wednesday informing them that their lease of
    transmitter facilities will be cancelled in 15 days time. A
    statement from BK Telecom on Thursday said that this was a direct
    attack on BK Television aimed at limiting its audience to Belgrade
    only. The statement said that RTS sent the note regardless of the
    fact that BK Television had a valid contract and paid the
    substantial rent regularly. BK quoted an opinion poll which says
    people think BK Television is the most professional and most
    objective local TV station. BK Telecom said that this was clearly
    a gross attack on the freedom of the media in Serbia.


    STUDENT PROTEST MARCH

    After their protest meeting in front of the School of Philosophy,
    Belgrade students went for a protest march to the Slavia junction
    and blocked the traffic there for an hour on Thursday. On the way
    back, they stopped in front of the National Museum, where there
    was a reception for the diplomatic corps and high state officials
    on Thursday.

    A rumour spread that the reception would be attended by Serbian
    Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic and Serbian President Slobodan
    Milosevic, so the students surrounded the building. A large police
    presence kept them some distance away. The students jeered as the
    Serbian Prime Minister, the Serbian Information Minister Radmila
    Milentijevic, the Deputy Foreign Minister Zivadin Jovanovic, the
    Vice-President of the Serbian Government Dragan Tomic and the
    Minister Branislav Ivkovic arrived. The Serbian President did not
    attend.


    BILDT'S LETTER TO YUGOSLAV FOREIGN MINISTER

    UN High Representative Carl Bildt forwarded a letter to Yugoslav
    Foreign Minister Milan Milutinovic on Wednesday, Mirko Klarin
    reported for FoNet from Brussels on Thursday. The letter said that
    the draft Agreement on Special Parallel relations between FR
    Yugoslavia and Republika Srpska would remain a draft until the
    Parliament of Bosnia Herzegovina verified it. The letter advised
    against ratification of the treaty by the Yugoslav Parliament
    prior to this. Mr. Bildt proposed that the Presidency and the
    Ministerial Council of Bosnia Herzegovina review the draft to
    establish whether it is in accordance with the Dayton agreement.


    SERBIAN PRIME MINISTER ON ECONOMIC COOPERATION WITH REPUBLIKA
    SRPSKA

    Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic made a statement after
    Thursday's meeting with government representatives from Republika
    Srpska (RS) in Belgrade. He said that economic relations between
    Serbia and the RS would soon be simplified, according to the RS
    newsagency SRNA and FoNet. Minister Marjanovic told journalists
    that the talks were about industry, agriculture, economic
    capacities and the formation of a single market. Asked how trade
    between the RS and Serbia, amounting to $600m last year, would be
    classified, Mr. Marjanovic replied that there would probably be no
    duty payable.


    PARLIAMENTARY REPRESENTATIVES OF YUGOSLAVIA AND RS MEET

    Representatives from the Parliaments of FR Yugoslavia and
    Republika Srpska (RS) met in Belgrade on Thursday. The information
    service of the Yugoslav Parliament said that the conclusion of the
    meeting was that the Agreement on Special Parallel Relations
    between FR Yugoslavia and Republica Srpska was in accordance with
    the Dayton and Paris Agreements, as well as the UN Charter. The
    two delegations stressed that the two countries thus contributed
    to the implementation of the Dayton agreement and the preservation
    of the peace in the region.


    SDA DEPUTIES WILL NOT RATIFY AGREEMENT BETWEEN YUGOSLAVIA AND RS

    A spokesman for the Bosnian Democratic Action Party (SDA), Ismet
    Grbo, announced on Thursday that the party's MPs in the Bosnian
    Parliament would not ratify the agreement between Republika Srpska
    (RS) and FR Yugoslavia. AFP reports that Mr. Grbo said that the
    agreement was counter to the Dayton agreement and the Constitution
    of Bosnia Herzegovina, according to FoNet. The SDA holds 20 out of
    42 seats in the second chamber of the Bosnian Parliament and one
    third in the upper chamber.


    GENERAL MANAGER OF 'BLIC' REPLIES TO 'DEMOKRATIJA'

    Ljubisa Stanojevic, General Manager of the Belgrade daily 'Blic'
    demanded on Thursday that the Belgrade daily 'Demokratija'
    publishes his reply to an article they published on March 4.

    Mr. Stanojevic's reply denies allegations that he resigned because
    'Blic' was funded from abroad and used for money-laundering. He
    accused the daily 'Demokratija' of unfair competition and base
    libel.


    GERMAN AMBASSADOR IN NIS

    German Ambassador to Belgrade Wilfried Gruber visited Nis on
    Thursday, according to FoNet. Mr. Gruber stated that his visit was
    intended to establish economic relations with Germany. a task
    which would be difficult because of Serbia's poor relations with
    international financal institutions. He said that FR Yugoslavia
    must meet the conditions for its return to the International
    Monetary Fund as soon as possible.


    DSS FOR CONSENSUS ON NATIONAL ISSUES

    Ljubisa Vucic, Vice-President of the Democratic Party of Serbia
    (DSS) said in Nis on Thursday that a consensus among the political
    parties in Serbia on national issues was urgently necessary,
    according to FoNet. He said that the Federation should stick
    together to combat terrorism in Kosovo. He pointed out that the
    DSS was against the allowing the international community to
    mediate in the internal affairs of Serbia. He commented that the
    recent terrorist actions in Kosovo were aimed at the
    internationalization of the Kosovo problem.


    KRSTIC ANNOUNCES SOON PASSING OF LAW ON PRIVATIZATION

    Svetozar Krstic, Vice-President of the Serbian Government,
    announced in an interview to Radio Television Serbia that the
    Serbian Parliament would soon consider a law on Privatization. He
    said that companies would have the right to choose how they were
    transferred into private ownership. The money made by selling the
    companies would go into several republic funds, including the
    pension, the social and the development funds. According to Mr.
    Krstic, the pension fund would thus get the capital it badly
    needs, the development fund would be able to pay for regional
    development, and the social fund would have money to pay more
    unemployment benefit, as privatization will cause job losses. He
    added that one of the goals of privatization was to decrease the
    national debt. He said that the funds, especially the development
    and the pension fund would reinvest a part of the capital into the
    privatized companies.


    DEMAND THAT SERBIAN PARLIAMENT REPLACES SERBIAN GOVERNMENT

    The University Council for Defence of Democracy demanded on
    Thursday that the Serbian Parliament replace the Serbian
    Government. The Council said that the current government was not
    capable of answering the challenges a University had put to it let
    alone those that a society poses.

    The Council said that the government's threats to cancel the
    faculties' funding and to replace ``the rebellious deans,'' as
    some government officials had styled them, were ``futile and
    failing attempts to solve the serious situation at the University
    of Belgrade.'' The Council accused the Government of being too
    weak to make the only decision that could solve the situation --
    the legitimisation of the de facto sacking of Mr. Dragutin
    Velickovic as the Chancellor of Belgrade University.


    NEWS IN BRIEF

    Representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross
    (ICRC) recently visited the Kosovo Albanians arrested under
    suspicion of terrorism, the ICRC Belgrade office stated on
    Thursday. The statement said that it had registered 37 arrested
    Albanians. ICRC staff had spoken to them in private. The ICRC then
    gave the prison governors ``adequate instructions.''

    Belgrade state media report that Serbian Parliamentary Speaker
    Dragan Tomic on Thursday announced that the first parliamentary
    sesson this year will be on March 17. One of the items on the
    agenda is the Agreement on Special Parallel Relations between FR
    Yugoslavia and Republika Srpska.

    Pope John Paul II is will arrive in Sarajevo on April 12, the
    Bosnian Catholic Archbishopry announced on Thursday. The visit is
    intended to strenghten peace, reconciliation and tolerance in
    Bosnia Herzegovina.

    The University Council for the Defence of Democracy called on the
    Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences on Thursday to support the
    Student Protest and use its authority and renown to make the
    regime accept the student demands. The Council warned that, if it
    failed to crush the student protest soon, the Serbian regime must
    be prepared to declare war on the University, according to Beta.

    A group of some 20 Macedonian students continued their hunger
    strike in central Skopje on Thursday, according to Makfaks.
    University and high-school students went for their 20th
    consecutive protest march against the Government's draft Act
    providing for parallel teaching in Albanian at the Education
    department in Skopje.


    RADIO BELGRADE COMMENTS

    The state-controlled Radio Belgrade broadcast a commentary on
    Thursday entitled ``Who and Manipulates the Students and how.''
    The commentary said that students were victims of the opposition
    coalition Zajedno's perfidious manipulations. It Claimed that
    Zajedno had used its active members, disguised as university
    lecturers and student leaders, to drag the students out into the
    streets, the commentary claimed. The true political goal of
    Zajedno and its agents, Radio Belgrade said, is abolishing the
    University's autonomy and subjecting it to party politics. The
    commentary said that it was the perverted imagination of foreign
    agents that thought up the chase after Chancellor Dragutin
    Velickovic, the leader of the University, a renowned scientist and
    an honourable person. The commentary ended on a light note, saying
    that the majority of the young people that have been so grossly
    manipulated would surely come to their senses and start using
    their own heads.

    Prepared by: Marija Milosavljevic
    Edited by: Mary Anne Wood

    ------------------------------------------------------------------
    ODRAZ B92, Belgrade                             Daily News Service
    E-mail: odrazb92@b92.opennet.org, beograd@siicom.com
    WWW:    http://www.siicom.com/odrazb/, http://www.opennet.org/b92/
    ------------------------------------------------------------------