BOSNIA TO GET STATE-LEVEL INTELLIGENCE SERVICE BY END OF YEAR

SARAJEVO, Sept 16 (Hina) - Bosnia-Herzegovina will get an intelligence service at the state level by the end of the year, when the current intelligence services in the country's two entities -- the Croat-Muslim federation and the Serb republic -- should cease existing, according to announcements made by the international community's High Representative, Paddy Ashdown, and a Hungarian diplomat, Kalman Kocsis, in Sarajevo on Tuesday. #L# Kocsis, who was in charge of reorganising Hungarian secret services, has been at the helm of a task force that has been preparing the reorganisation of the said services in Bosnia in recent months. On Tuesday, he handed over a draft act on an Intelligence-Security Agency (OSA) to the chairman of the Bosnian Council of Ministers, Adnan Terzic. The draft act is to be forwarded into parliamentary procedure and should be adopted by 1 January 2004 at the latest. The task force, which has prepared the bill, consists of foreign and Bosnian experts in this field. Under the law, no political influence could be exerted on the new intelligence service. The act provides for strict control over the work of the OSA in order to prevent possible forms of abuse of office. For instance, phone-tapping would be carried out only with the previous approval of a court, namely the State Prosecutor's Office. The activities of the OSA range from the fight against international terrorism, smuggling of narcotics and organised crime to the collection of data on war crimes suspects. Ashdown said the reorganisation of the intelligence services as well as reforms in the defence sector and tax systems were the most important tasks which Sarajevo should fulfil in order to come closer to the European Union. (hina) ms