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MILS NEWS 08/05/96

From: "M.I.L.S." <mils@MILS.SPIC.ORG.MK>

Macedonian Information Liaison Service Directory

CONTENTS

  • [01] MODALITIES FOR SPREADING THE ALLIANCE DISCUSSED

  • [02] KIRO GLIGOROV IN PARIS TODAY

  • [03] AGREEMENT WITH HUNGARY ON TRADE AND ECONOMIC COOPERATION

  • [04] TURKISH LAND FORCES COMMANDER IN MACEDONIA

  • [05] 'BORBA' ACCUSES SKOPJE OF SUPPORTING THE TERRORISM IN KOSOVO

  • [06] BULGARIAN PRESIDENT IS SORRY FOR MACEDONIA

  • [07] DEEPENING THE MACEDONIAN-ITALIAN RELATIONS

  • [08] DISPUTE ABOUT THE SCHOOL RECORDS

  • [09] CRVENKOVSKI - 'MACEDONIAN POLICE BEFORE THE NEIGHBOURING ONES'

  • [10] NEWS ABOUT THE 'KOMERCIJALNA BANK CASE'

  • [11] INTERNATIONAL BOOKS FAIR OPENED

    MILS SUPPLEMENT

  • [12] 'Why Didn't Macedonia Ratify the Convention on Human Rights of CoE?'


  • MILS NEWS

    Skopje, 08 May 1996

    [01] MODALITIES FOR SPREADING THE ALLIANCE DISCUSSED

    The official announcement issued after the meeting of NATO Vice Secretary General Anthony Craig and Macedonian President Kiro Gligorov in Skopje yesterday, read that they had talked about the political and security situation in the Balkans, as well as about the development of the cooperation between Macedonia and NATO. Gligorov had stressed the permanent determination of Macedonia to become an Alliance member and to be included in all European collective security systems. Macedonian President had also presented his opinion that the Europeanisation of the Balkans should understand including of the European collective security structures, which would be the best way to surpass the negative experiences from the Balkan (dis)unions based on religious, ethnic or the so-called traditional strategies.

    Gligorov and Anthony Craig both positively estimated the fact that Macedonia had joined the 'Partnership for Peace' Programme and expressed their belief that the cooperation between Macedonia and NATO will develop further.

    During the talks with Macedonian Prime Minister Branko Crvenkovski, Vice Secretary General of NATO said he was satisfied with the level reached in the development of the democratic processes in Macedonia. He stressed that the dialogue about the program which would improve the Macedonia-NATO cooperation was starting.

    Mr. Craig told the Macedonian officials that the goal of his visit was to discuss the NATO study on its spreading and the modalities it anticipates. He said it was too early to talk about the future status of Macedonia within the Alliance, and stressed that the issue of the eventual spreading of NATO would not be discussed before the end of this year.

    He also informed that there was a resistance from Russia to have the Alliance widened. According to Mr. Craig, NATO considered that its spreading would not be used to create an influence sphere in the Central and Eastern Europe, but as a way to develop the security in the Euro-Atlantic area. That is why it was considered that spreading of NATO would be a positive step, and, according to Mr. Craig, NATO was making efforts to convince Russia in that and to maintain good cooperative relations with that country, based on a mutual respect.

    [02] KIRO GLIGOROV IN PARIS TODAY

    President of the Republic of Macedonia Kiro Gligorov should go to Paris today to meet the French President Jacque Chirac and French Foreign Affairs Minister Herve de Charette. This will be the third meeting between the two countries' Presidents. As Macedonian media reported, Gligorov should also present a lecture titled 'Macedonia, the situation in the Balkans and in Europe', at the French International Relations Institute in Paris.

    President Gligorov will be joined by Macedonian Foreign Minister Ljubomir Frchkovski.

    [03] AGREEMENT WITH HUNGARY ON TRADE AND ECONOMIC COOPERATION

    Macedonian and Hungarian governmental representatives signed an Agreement yesterday on the mutual trade and economic cooperation yesterday in Skopje. The Chambers of Commerce of the two countries also signed a cooperation Agreement, and the Trade Department Office of the Republic of Hungary in Skopje was officially opened. Both countries' representatives stressed that the cooperation should be the greatest in the fields of telecommunications, of construction (through the Skopje enterprise 'Beton'), and of the oil derivatives industry (through the local companies 'Ohis' and 'Makpetrol').

    [04] TURKISH LAND FORCES COMMANDER IN MACEDONIA

    Turkish Army General Hikmet Bayar, the Commander of the Turkish land forces, has arrived yesterday in Macedonia to visit Macedonian military forces. He is expected to meet with Macedonian Defense Minister Blagoj Hanjiski and the Macedonian Army Chief of Staff General Trajche Krstevski.

    The guest will also visit 'Ilinden' barracks, Macedonian Army Military Academy, as well as the towns of Bitola and Ohrid.

    [05] 'BORBA' ACCUSES SKOPJE OF SUPPORTING THE TERRORISM IN KOSOVO

    'Skopje supports and justifies the terrorism of Shiptars in Kosovo,' read an article titled 'Skopje Supports the Terrorists' in the yesterday's issue of the pro- governmental daily 'Borba'. 'Makfax' reported that 'Borba' based that evaluation on the articles of 'Nova Makedonija', which, as alleged, claimed that 'the non- Serbian population in Kosovo is being repressed. 'Borba' wrote that the pro-governmental 'Nova Makedonija' had openly taken the side of Shiptars. The Belgrade paper also read that all the other Macedonian media had given a great publicity to the recent happenings in Kosovo and had 'showed a great concern about them'.

    The paper reminded that the Skopje media 'seem to forget that Macedonia does not respect the human rights, as the last year UN reports on Human Rights said'. The paper supports that with the stand that there are about 250,000 Serbs in Macedonia, who are not mentioned in the Constitution, as well as with the claim that Macedonian public keeps in secret that Macedonians and members of the other nationalities are being mistreated by the Albanians.

    According to 'Borba', this is especially the case with western Macedonia, where 'an open Albanisation is taking place'.

    [06] BULGARIAN PRESIDENT IS SORRY FOR MACEDONIA

    Bulgarian President Zelju Zelev, in his speech on the occasion of the Bulgarian Army Day, criticized the ruling Bulgarian Socialist Party for the 'ambiguous position they are leading Bulgaria towards, regarding the joining of the country to NATO'. According to Macedonian media, Zelev also stated that the Bulgarian syndrome, which had always pushed the country to the groups of losers, might be activated again. In that context, Bulgarian President stressed: 'That was how we, instead of uniting the Bulgarian people within its ethnic borders during the Balkan and the other Wars, lost Dobrudza, Trakia and Macedonia.'

    [07] DEEPENING THE MACEDONIAN-ITALIAN RELATIONS

    'Macedonian-Italian Relations' will be the subject of the meeting that will take place on 10 and 11 May in Bitola, during which many reports will be presented in the field of politics, economy, history, art and linguistics by a great number of famous Macedonian and Italian scientists.

    The meeting is intended for deepening the cooperation between the two people, and it was initiated by the Macedonian-Italian Friendship Association from Bitola.

    Besides informing about the meeting, Italian Ambassador to Macedonia Faustino Troni said the new visas regulations for Macedonian citizens were brought against the will of Italy and under the pressure of the EU decisions. He pointed out that Macedonian citizens were, however, treated much better that the others.

    [08] DISPUTE ABOUT THE SCHOOL RECORDS

    44 MPs voted for, 10 against and 15 restrained from voting for the Laws on Changing the Laws on Primary and Secondary Education at yesterday's 44th session of the Macedonian Parliament. The previous Laws contained certain entries which allowed to have the school records written in the teaching languages, but they were abolished by the Constitutional Court. The new Laws, therefore, fulfill this gap by allowing new regulations to be brought about the records by the competent minister.

    The Albanian deputies estimated this was a step back, saying that nothing would be achieved by restrictions, and that all this was leading towards the assimilation of the Albanians in Macedonia. They also called the Macedonian Constitution 'a generator of tensions', and the Constitutional Court 'a daily-politics court'. The stand of Sali Ramadani was the most radical, as he said that these changes would not be carried out by any teacher in Albanian.

    The stand of the Liberals was that the new regulations gave too big authorizations to the minister of education. Present Education Minister Sofia Todorova disagreed with that and said that much more important matters than this could be solved by acts lower than the Laws.

    Macedonian MPs also ratified some bilateral agreements with Slovenia, and decided the number of the judges in the Appellate courts.

    [09] CRVENKOVSKI - 'MACEDONIAN POLICE BEFORE THE NEIGHBOURING ONES'

    Macedonian Prime Minister Branko Crvenkovski yesterday addressed the members of the police, on the occasion of their holiday, 7 May. He positively estimated their work and stressed that Macedonia had reached better results in all security spheres than all its neighbouring countries.

    Internal Affairs Minister Tomislav Chokrevski stated that the Ministry was not satisfied with the attitude of some local media and of certain political structures towards this Ministry, and that a better communication was necessary. He said there were certain acts (articles and speculations) against the Ministry, which are 'an assassination of the Macedonian society and of this Administration that should take care of the people'. He announced that the Ministry would fight against that by openly presenting the truth.

    Macedonian President Kiro Gligorov also sent his greetings for the holiday to the Ministry, and stressed that many efforts are still left to be made to increase the security and peace of the Macedonian citizens.

    [10] NEWS ABOUT THE 'KOMERCIJALNA BANK CASE'

    A-1 Television reported that Macedonian National Bank Governor Borko Stanoevski said the Executive Board of the Komercijalna Bank will gather in Friday to appoint an acting director. This should create conditions to choose a new general manager in two-three months time.

    A delegation of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the second largest shareholder of Komercijalna Bank, should arrive for a two-days visit to Skopje today.

    Meanwhile, Macedonian Television informed on a written protest of this Bank's Union. The protest reads that the releasing from duty of the Bank's General Manager Alexandar Manevski is against the Constitution and the Laws, and without any basis. The employees support the conclusion and decision of their Executive Board that the General Manager had always worked strictly in accordance with the legislations, which was also the conclusion of the shareholders. The Union, therefore, asks from the Governor to withdraw his decision, and in case this does not happen, they will use all the legal means to obtain their rights.

    [11] INTERNATIONAL BOOKS FAIR OPENED

    The 8th International Books Fair was officially opened by Macedonian Prime Minister Branko Crvenkovski yesterday in Skopje. More than 4,000 books will be presented, 30 publishing houses from Macedonia and 17 Albania, Bulgaria, Italy, Croatia, FR Yugoslavia and Great Britain. Many promotions and meetings with the authors will take place, and the producers of reproduction graphics materials, paper, etc. will also present themselves.

    MILS SUPPLEMENT

    [12] 'Why Didn't Macedonia Ratify the Convention on Human Rights of CoE?'

    ('Dnevnik', 08 May 1996)

    Being a member of the Council of Europe (CoE), Macedonia should ratify the Convention on Human Rights within a year since the reception, i.e. till November 1996.

    As the MPs Nikola Popovski (SDSM) and Mevljan Tahiri (PDP) told us, the Convention will be ratified till then. It means that Prof. Gjorgji Marjanovic was wrong when he said for 'Dnevnik' that we were late in this matter.

    'The terms to fulfill this and the other obligations were agreed on with the CoE together. As the dead line is November this year, one could say that we are late only after that term,' said Popovski.

    The Convention is one of the basic, if not the most basic CoE document that refers to the individual and collective human rights. It was passed in 1950s and has been changed 11 times since then, i.e. there are 11 Protocols as separate documents.

    'Macedonia has realized some of the obligations it has as a CoE member by having them implemented in its Constitution and Laws,' said Popovski. 'The ratification will take place when the Government submits them to the Parliament, after which we will inform the CoE that it is completed.'

    Mevljan Tahiri from PDP claimed that there were no specific reason for not having these documents ratified.

    'I hope it will be done, since the Convention on Minorities' Rights and some other documents that refer to the protection of languages and to the local governing will be a basis for positive changes in the minorities' rights in Macedonia to happen,' he said.

    Prof. Zvonimir Jankulovski, who teaches at the Faculty of Security and is an expert in the human rights issues, thinks the ratification process has been unnecessary prolonged. He finds the possible reasons for that in the long term process of developing the conscience in the field of human rights in Macedonia, which is a huge process that requires deep changes in almost all spheres of the political and legal system.

    'By ratifying the Convention, Macedonia will have to adopt all the clear and precise international legal obligations referring to the protection of rights. The document enables every individual to address the international organisations in case some of their rights cited in it have been violated. This might be the basic reason for the prolonging of the ratification, said Jankulovski.

    'The long and systematically built traditional understanding that the relations between the state and the individuals, regarding the human rights, are exclusively internal problems of the country will have to be forgotten. This traditional concept will be abandoned by the ratification of the CoE Convention, and the protection of human rights will be transferred from a national to an international terrain,' presented Jankulovski his opinion.

    (end)

    mils news 08 May, 1996

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