HSP ROUND-TABLE: WHAT ARE SANCTIONS AGAINST CROATIA?

ZAGREB, Oct 23 (Hina) - Political sanctions are more realistic to be expected than the widest form of sanctions, if it comes to that, the president of the Croatian Party of Rights (HSP), Ante Djapic, said at a round-table entitled "What Are Sanctions Against Croatia", which this opposition party organised on Wednesday. #L# The conference was attended by Croatian economists, lawyers and politicians. Rattling with sanctions makes an ideal climate for concealing the government's economic and other failures, Djapic said. The Croatian political public either underestimates or overestimates the problem of sanctions which could be imposed on Croatia for its failure to cooperate with the Hague-based international war crimes tribunal in the case of the indictment against General Janko Bobetko, Djapic said. He added that some media were frivolously scaring the Croatian public with sanctions. Even more underestimated are consequences of a possible government's consent to the section of the indictment which qualifies the Croatian army's liberating operations in the Homeland War as planned ethnic cleansing. The HSP believes it indisputable that the indictment against General Bobetko is unacceptable for Croatia, and that consent to it would mean Croatia's consent to claims that Croatian armed forces had carried out an aggression against the "Republika Srpska Krajina". This Serb para-state is described in the indictment as a peace- loving state bordering with Croatia, while no word is mentioned of Serb rebels on Croatian territory, who carried out genocide and destroyed Croatia brutally, Djapic said. He said it was, therefore, reasonable, for the government to enter a legal dispute with the Hague tribunal. Ivo Skrabalo, a leader of the Libra party, believes there is no direct danger from sanctions. The decisions on sanctions are made by the UN Security Council, which established the Hague-based tribunal. The tribunal is now fighting for existing as long as possible, although it is not professional in a great degree, Skrabalo said. He added that the tribunal was exploiting the noise raised around General Bobetko to have its budget granted. Skrabalo describes informal sanctions, which would eliminate benefits for Croatia, as more dangerous, since this would have heavy consequences on the economy. Economist Guste Santtini asked whether Croatia needed to think about the European Union at this time. He assessed that the EU had created an amorphous mass from Croatia in which the national and social spirit and the strategy of economic growth have been lost. Slobodan Lang of the Democratic Centre (DC) party, said there could be no talk of sanctions without providing citizens with complete information as to what their imposition would imply. "We can be for or against General Bobetko's extradition, but handing him over because we are afraid that we will not be getting any chewing-gum is terrible," he said. "It is not important for (the tribunal's chief prosecutor) Carla Del Ponte that Croatia hands over the general, but to continue her pressures with the threat of sanctions," Zvonimir Separovic, a lawyer, said. Croatia must continue its cooperation with the Hague tribunal, but it should also insist on its rights through active politics, Separovic said. (hina) lml