BOSNIAN DIPLOMAT'S CITIZENSHIP REVOKED

SARAJEVO, March 12 (Hina) - The First Secretary of Bosnia's Mission to the United Nations, Darko Trifunovic, has been suspended after it was established that he had obtained Bosnian citizenship illegally, the Bosnian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday. As part of counter-terrorist actions which began in Bosnia after September 11, 2001, the UN Council of Ministers ordered an investigation of the citizenship of all state administration officials. It was then established that Trifunovic acquired his citizenship certificate by illegal means. He was born in Belgrade, where he requested a change of residence in 1996. He then submitted a resident permit in Brcko, Bosnia, based on which Bosnian Serb authorities issued him Bosnian documents. Sarajevo's daily "Slobodna Bosna" was the first to publish the "Trifunovic case" story. It wrote that the diplomat represented Bosnia in New York in a scandalous way, and did everything possible to promote Belgrade's interests. There has been speculation that sending Trifunovic to Bosnia had been planned during Yugoslavia's international isolation. (hina) lml sb