OHR CAN'T STILL CONFIRM APPOINTMENT OF PETRICH

SARAJEVO, June 29 (Hina) - The Office of the High Representative for Bosnia-Herzegovina (OHR) is still expecting the official appointment of the successor to Carlos Westendorp, the incumbent international High Representative to Bosnia-Herzegovina in charge of the implementation of the Dayton Accords. The OHR cannot yet confirm whether an Austrian diplomat, Wolfgang Petrich, will replace the Spanish Westendorp, a spokesman for the OHR, James Ferguson, said in Sarajevo on Tuesday. Ferguson told reporters that they now possessed only unofficial information which German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder conveyed on Monday at the Socialist International Congress in Rio de Janeiro saying that the European Union special envoy for Kosovo Petrich is likely to assume the post of the High Representative in Bosnia. Carlos Westendorp who has been the international High Representative in the past two years, has already announced his departure from Bosnia in July. the OHR in Sarajevo is waiting for Germany which is chairing the EU to release an official decision on Westendorp's successor. Ferguson added that Westendorp's deputy, German diplomat Hans Schummacher, would leave Bosnia next week to take the office of the deputy head of the German mission to the United Nations in New York. (hina) ms