GRANIC: DEL PONTE WILL NOT VISIT ZAGREB

ZAGREB, Aug 21 (Hina) - The Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY), Carla del Ponte, will not visit Zagreb in September, Croatia's First Deputy Prime Minister Goran Granic said on Tuesday. #L# About ten days ago, there were plans for del Ponte to visit Zagreb as part of her tour to Sarajevo and Belgrade, but the idea has been abandoned in the meantime. Del Ponte will not visit Zagreb because she has no special questions to make, Granic said. Zagreb has not received any new indictments, Granic said. He did confirm though that before its collective holiday the government received an ICTY request for some documents which refer to the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina, i.e., events in the Mostar area. The Hague tribunal has been processing only events in Central Bosnia so far and the prosecution is now probably opening issues connected to events in the Mostar area, he said. The ICTY request has not been processed and the documents have not been handed over yet. The procedure is underway and it could be completed in late August or early September, Granic said. The request refers to four groups, involving some 30 names, Granic said. Asked if the request referred to Generals Slobodan Praljak and Stanko Sopta, Granic said this was probably true, and mentioned the name of Jadranko Prlic in that context as well. However, he said, those names also include the names of people who did not make any decisions or participated in war operations but dealt with information. It is not known if some of those people will be indicted by the ICTY, Granic said, adding that someone would still have to answer, for example, for prison camps in Herzegovina. The ICTY has also requested some communications between the said persons and the office of late president Franjo Tudjman on war issues, if such documents exist, Granic said. Commenting on an article in the latest issue of the Newsweek weekly saying the CIA supplied General Ante Gotovina with intelligence information and knew what was happening during and after Operation 'Storm' as well as that the Hague tribunal would have a hard time proving Gotovina's guilt, Granic said briefly the CIA knew what was happening and what was going to happen. Everybody knew everything, he said. (hina) rml