Sarajevo – US Special Envoy Robert Gelbard met with Chairman of the BiH Presidency Alija Izetbegovic to discuss several issues: agreement with the London Club, the joint police forces in the Neretva-Herzegovina Canton, a single currency, return of refugees and the issue of Brcko. Afterwards, the US Envoy held talks with members of the BiH Presidency to review opening of airports in BiH, railway traffic, telecommunication issues, etc.Following the meeting with Mr. Gelbard, the BiH Presidency held consultations on the issue of BiH diplomatic offices and it was decided to have meeting twice a week to resolve this issue.
The media highlighted Gelbard’s statement given to the press in which he severely criticized the Croatian authorities in Mostar for not following their commitments on the formation of the joint police forces. He declared that they have no credibility any more and threatened that all economic assistance would be cut off to this area.
He went on to say that he was even more frustrated with the problem of the police in the RS and that he was astonished at stupidity of some policemen in the RS seeking confrontation with SFOR, adding that the RS leadership was urged to restructure the police force as set forth in Annex 7 of the DPA.
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Mostar – Top officials of the FBiH Interior Ministry held a meeting at the temporary seat of that ministry attended also by IPTF Commissioner Manfred Seitner. Another attempt to agree on measures for the formation of the joint police forces in the Neretva-Herzegovina has failed again. Cantonal Interior Minister Valentin Coric remained adamant to his position that national composition of the police should be determined in accordance with the current situation on the ground and not with the 1991 consensus.
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Sarajevo – BiH officials signed an agreement with the London Club on re-programming and the reduction of the BiH debt from US $ 1,04 billion to 400 million. Co-Chair in the CoM Haris Silajdzic described this agreement as extraordinarily successful and underlined that despite some disagreements, the CoM had acted as a team.
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Ban on Radovan Karadzic – Robert Frowick, Chief of the OSCE mission in BiH has publicly prohibited Radovan Karadzic from registering for the local elections in the RS. The media quoted Frowick’s statement in full. Frowick recalled that last July, Karadzic had signed a statement not to participate in any future elections.
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Plavsic versus Kijac – The media reported extensively on RS President Biljana Plavsic’s address to the press in which she seriously criticized RS Interior Minister Dragan Kijac requesting his resignation. She reportedly admitted that an attempt to arrest her was made in Belgrade two nights ago and qualified these proceedings as a coup d’etat.
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Summary SRT News
Pale – The session of the SDS HQ – SDS representatives discussed the current political situation in the RS. Among other members, the RS Government and other high ranking officials also attended the session. The SDS HQ adopted the following conclusions: 1. SDS HQ support the RS Government’s position which protects the Minister of Interior Kijac’s legality and rejects the RS President’s illegal decisions with that regard; 2. SDS HQ invited the RS President to return to the state capital and co-ordinate her position with the rest of the state bodies, since the RS Assembly is the only body to make such decisions; 3. If the RS President doesn’t accept the demands above, SDS HQ will request her to resign and transfer her duties over to Vice-president Mirjanic; 4. If the RS President does not accept any of the demands above, SDS HQ will ask from the Assembly to initiate a process of revoking her mandate.4:00
Banja Luka – Plavsic’s extraordinary press conference – Plavsic informed the media about the current political situation in the RS, focusing on her relations with Interior Minister Kijac. According to Plavsic, Kijac constantly refused to co-operate with her, which is against the RS Constitution, and his decisions are endangering the security of the whole of RS. Therefore, in line with her constitutional powers, she asked for his suspension. She warned the media about the criminal acts endorsed by the RS MUP, Kijac, his assistants and some high ranking RS officials with regard to enterprises ‘Selekt Impex’ and ‘Centrex’, saying that those enterprises are registered to an non-existing person and do not pay taxes. Therefore, all the income goes to certain private pockets, whereas the RS budget stays empty and the RS people dissatisfied and poor, ‘which I as the RS President cannot tolerate.’ She also accused Kalinic, Klickovic, and Kijac for boycotting the last two sessions of the Supreme VRS Council [because they wanted to move the army HQ to Pale]. She warned that the international community will not tolerate this situation, but use it instead to ‘melt’ the RS into a unified BiH. She also complained that the session of the SDS session was held at the moment when the SDS members knew she wouldn’t be able to come.
5:00
Glas srpski comment on the RS President’s decisions – When the RS President decided to suspend Kijac on her own, without consultations with the rest of the RS leadership, which was illegal by the Constitution, there was nothing else she could have expected but negative consequences. Her decision was however expectable since she couldn’t have established co-operation with the representatives of state bodies, although it was her obligation. She faced disaster at the assembly sessions on three occasions, such as when she disagreed with the establishment of parallel relations between RS and FRY. How is it possible for the RS President to oppose relations with the Serb motherland, without which the Serbs in the RS wouldn’t be able to survive? Perhaps this is the reason she couldn’t establish relations with Serbian and FRY leadership except with some unimportant opposition leaders. She must be aware of the fact that FRY is the signatory of the DPA and that the RS will not be able to implement the DPA without it. Plavsic unfortunately became persona non grata in her own motherland, and jeopardised the relations between the RS and FRY. Plavsic probably didn’t know that the UBSD Vice-president, Sejfudin Tokic endorses her position although he is at the same time a great supporter of a unified BiH, which is against the DPA. Glas srpski compares this situation with the one related to former Prime Minister Kasagic, adding that the only difference between these cases is that the international community is much more involved in protection of the RS President. Plavsic was also criticised for calling her political opponents criminals instead of discussing this issue at the highest political level. Glas Srpski was stunned with the information that Plavsic gave her statement with regard to suspension of Interior Minister Kijac to independent media and not to Glas srpski, which has never refused to publish any of her comments. They quoted Plavsic that people are her lobby, asking how come that the Presidential palace is surrounded by so many policemen if she isn’t afraid of her people. They also concluded that those policemen wear the same uniforms, but their faces are not familiar to Banja Luka people, and asked if she engaged personal guards to defend her. In the end, Glas srpski concluded that Plavsic should resign if she is not willing to respect the RS institutions.
10:00
The National Assembly Speaker, Kalinic announced that the 10th RS Assembly session will be held on July 4, but didn’t mention the items of the Agenda.
Sarajevo – The Presidency session – The Presidency discussed allocation of ambassador posts but didn’t find a final solution to the issue. Krajisnik said that a certain number of embassies and consulates should be reduced. They also talked with the US Special Envoy Gelbard and summed up the results achieved so far. Krajisnik stressed again the RS position with regard to relations between the RS police and SFOR and IPTF, which is the problem that cannot be solved as the IPTF would wish to. The authority over the Banja Luka airport cannot be given to CoM since the airport belongs to the airport company in Banja Luka. Gelbard accused all three sides of slowing down the implementation, especially the Croat and RS sides. The RS was accused of disrespect of Annex 11 of the DPA, whereas Krajisnik said that this was Gelbard’s mistake, since he cannot call police check points illegal since they were established on the roads in order to control the black marketeers.
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Pale – The CoM Co-chair Bosic talked with the German economic delegation about the establishment of branch offices for production of car parts for Skoda Felicia.
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Pale – Minister Albijanic and the Swiss delegation talked about the reconstruction of the telecommunication system between the RS and Federation, which should result in the establishment of 100,000 telephone lines.
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