YU. MINISTER SAYS BORDER INCIDENT WAS RESULT OF POOR ORGANISATION

BELGRADE, July 29 (Hina) - All Belgrade media on Monday covered an incident which occurred on the Croatian-Yugoslav border on the Danube on Sunday, when the Yugoslav army shot towards and arrested a Croatian delegation. #L# The media stress the incident took place near a river islet which was part of Croatian territory until 1991, when the Yugoslav army occupied it. A border dispute between the two countries remains unsettled, it is said. Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica's office released a statement following yesterday's meeting with Croatian counterpart Stjepan Mesic after the incident. The two presidents were strongly confident the incident would not affect bilateral relations, the statement read. They will urge competent bodies to do everything to prevent such incidents from reoccurring, it added. The incident was "the consequence of a poor organisation of a good idea," Yugoslav Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic told Radio B92 after yesterday's talks with Croatia's Prime Minister-designate Ivica Racan and parliament president Zlatko Tomcic. Svilanovic added the incident was the result of oversights by both sides which he said had failed to notify competent departments on both borders about the cruise along the Danube. Svilanovic said his meeting with Racan was aimed at showing that both governments maintained that such incidents could not ruin what had been done on the advancement of bilateral relations. He said he had regretted that shots had been fired. "We have seen too much shooting in this region in the past decade and such things shouldn't happen," he said. The president of the Executive Council of the northern Yugoslav province of Vojvodina, Djordje Djukic, who was present at the Racan-Svilanovic talks, said the Yugoslav army had not been notified that a Croatian delegation would arrive at Backa Palanka across the Danube. The fact that Croatian and Yugoslav sides met immediately after the incident indicates that both wish to continue with the normalisation of relations, said Djukic. (hina) ha