ICTY: MESIC-DEL PONTE CONVERSATION WAS MATTER OF COURTESY

ZAGREB, June 23 (Hina) - The telephone conversation between the chief prosecutor of the Hague's war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), Carla Del Ponte, and Croatian President Stjepan Mesic, which they conducted on Friday, was exclusively a matter of courtesy and its purpose was to confirm the content of a letter which Del Ponte sent in reply to Mesic's initiative regarding runaway Croatian General Ante Gotovina, Del Ponte's spokeswoman Florance Hartmann said Monday. #L# "The conversation, conducted at the initiative of the chief prosecutor, was brief and a matter of courtesy, its purpose being to fully confirm the content of the letter," Hartmann said. The Nacional weekly reported on Monday that the conversation lasted half an hour and fully pertained to the Gotovina case, i.e. that Del Ponte and Mesic "spoke in detail even about possible scenarios regarding Gotovina". The weekly cited diplomatic circles in Zagreb as its sources. "What Nacional is insinuating about the content of the conversation is not correct," the spokeswoman said. Del Ponte's office expressed regret about the media treatment of the issue of the fugitive general. "We regret that the press continues to manipulate the issue and does not respect what Carla Del Ponte wrote in her letter to President Mesic, namely that one should return the issue from the political into the court sphere," Hartmann said. Having been on the run for almost two years, Gotovina recently gave an interview to Nacional, after which Mesic launched an initiative regarding the possibility of changing his status into that of a suspect, which Del Ponte refused in her letter. (hina) lml sb