SARAJEVO MEDIA SLAM NOVI TRAVNIK MEETING

SARAJEVO, Oct 30 (Hina) - The meeting of supporters of the Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia-Herzegovina (HDZ BiH) in Novi Travnik last Saturday and their decision to call a referendum of the BH Croat people met with exceptionally sharp criticism in Sarajevo. The other three Croat parties based in Sarajevo - the New Croat Initiative (NHI), Croatian Peasants' Party (HSS) and the Croat People's Union (HNZ) - distanced themselves from the meeting which declared itself a Croat national assembly. The three parties said the meeting in Novi Travnik was another attempt of pre-election manipulation, aimed at mobilising a fairly listless Croat electoral body by using intimidation. Ivo Komsic, a vice-president of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), the party expecting significant success in the November 11 vote, said the declaration on the rights and position of the BH Croat people, adopted at the meeting, was nothing else but the continuation of HDZ's war policy aimed at splitting up the country. "It is very clear that this is about the dismantling of Bosnia- Herzegovina, an act which continues the policy of resettlement and the establishment of a third entity," Komsic told Monday's issue of 'Dnevni avaz' daily. Komsic was very critical about the fact that high representatives of the Catholic church, including cardinal Vinko Puljic, had attended the gathering. Their attendance is contrary to everything the Catholic church in Bosnia-Herzegovina advocated during the war, said Komsic. Somewhat milder, but still critical was friar Petar Andjelovic, until recently the head of the Bosnian Franciscan order and now the guardian of St. Anthony's monastery in Sarajevo. According to him, the church dignitaries should "have avoided favouring one party because that is always misunderstood." Friar Luka Marsic, a vice president of the Croat People's Council, said the church dignitaries who had attended the Novi Travnik meeting, should distance themselves from the gathering publicly and unambiguously. Sulejman Tihic of the Party of Democratic Action (SDA) believes the decisions adopted at the Saturday meeting contravened the constitutions of the state and its two entities. The decision on calling a referendum was adopted by an unauthorised body and the content of the referendum question encroaches upon the Constitution, said Tihic. Haris Silajdzic of the Party for Bosnia-Herzegovina said the referendum made sense only if it would lead to the establishment of a united and decentralised country. The Sarajevo media did not spare HDZ's current election campaign either. 'Oslobodjenje' daily said that everything that could be heard in Novi Travnik sounded "frighteningly familiar." "Let us recall, this is how it all began when 'democrats' from the Serb Democratic Party, led by the leader whose name it is not very wise to mention in public, demanded their own political, cultural, scientific and information institutions," the daily reads. "Dnevni avaz", too, estimates that the whole story about the referendum boiled down to the wish to establish a third entity. The Office of the High Representative (OHR) and the OSCE Mission in the country considered the Novi Travnik meeting part of HDZ's pre- election activities, launched because of the fear of losing power. The referendum, even if it is held on November 11, will have no practical effect, and in case it is assessed as a violation of the election process, those responsible for it might face serious consequences. (hina) rml