KOSTUNICA WITHDRAWS REQUEST FOR SERBIAN GOVT ACCOUNTABILITY

BELGRADE, Aug 24 (Hina) - Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica today partly cushioned the request of his party, the Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS), for a vote of confidence to the Serbian government of Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic. At a regular news conference in Belgrade, Kostunica explained his attitude about withdrawing the issue of the vote of confidence was caused by the fact this could lead to early elections. He thought elections, both federal and republic, should be held only after the adoption of the new Yugoslav Constitution -- should the federal republic be preserved -- and then the Serbian Constitution. Kostunica suggested a solution to the current crisis in the DOS coalition and accusations slung between his and Djindjic's Democratic Party (DS) as being the forming of a committee of inquiry which would clear the affair concerning the murder of a former Serbian police official, Momir Gavrilovic. Another committee of inquiry would, he said, analyse the writing of foreign press about the tobacco affair and the mafia as was run by Britain's Guardian and Financial Times. Kostunica thus openly accused Djindjic for having allowed the British papers connect the premier with tobacco smugglers. The president also accused the Serbian government for being responsible for "the undermining of the Serbian constitutional order", having passed many bylaws directly toppling the federal republic. (hina) lml sb