CRO ARMY GENERAL TO RESIGN ON DUTIES AT DEFENCE MINISTRY

ZAGREB, Jan 25 (Hina) - Croatian Assistant Defence Minister Major General Ljubo Cesic-Rojs will resign on all of his duties at the Ministry of Defence, he said in a statement on Tuesday. Cesic-Rojs furthermore said he authorised his legal representative to press slander charges against Stipe Mesic, a Croatian presidential candidate. The Major General said he was astonished and shocked by Mesic's statement in which the presidential candidate, according to the statement, "has threatened generals, editors, journalists, namely all who criticised the statements (Mesic) made during the first round of the presidential campaign." Cesic-Rojs said Mesic had interpreted the Major General's criticism, voiced in a "Vecernji List" daily interview, as an attempted coup d'etat. "Neither as a presidential candidate, nor as a possible President of the Republic and the Armed Forces can he make statements which have no foundation," Cesic-Rojs said in today's statement. The Major General said that when making his statements, he was not speaking as a Croatian army general and assistance minister of defence, but a Croatian citizen and member of that section of the Croatian people which "did not deserve Mesic's jokes and insults." (hina) ha mm