BANJA LUKA, Feb 28 (Hina) - Claims that all three Bosnian peoples are threatened, which are being made ahead of local elections in the country, are very dangerous and destructive for the entire country, High Representative Paddy
Ashdown said in an interview with Banja Luka's Nezavisne Novine daily of Saturday.
BANJA LUKA, Feb 28 (Hina) - Claims that all three Bosnian peoples are
threatened, which are being made ahead of local elections in the
country, are very dangerous and destructive for the entire country,
High Representative Paddy Ashdown said in an interview with Banja
Luka's Nezavisne Novine daily of Saturday. #L#
Ashdown said that by claiming that their peoples were threatened,
local politicians were preparing their electorate for local elections
which are scheduled for early October.
In Sarajevo it is claimed that Bosniaks are threatened, in Banja Luka
one can hear that Serbs are threatened and in Mostar you hear the same
about Croats. All three sides have the same story, Ashdown said.
Commenting on the selection of candidates for the country's defence
minister, Ashdown warned the authorities to choose between the short
deadline and the person who would not represent the past.
He said that the decision of the chairman of the Council of Ministers,
Adnan Terzic, to refuse the candidacy of Branko Stevic was correct and
brave and that he believed that Stevic was not the person who should
represent Bosnia-Herzegovina before the international community.
Stevic, deputy mayor of the northeastern town of Bijeljina, was the
Serb Democratic Party's candidate for defence minister. Terzic
rejected his candidacy because of his role in the war. Stevic was
police chief in Bijeljina in 1993 and 1994, when mass killings of
local Muslims occurred.
(Hina) rml