'VJESNIK' EDITOR-IN-CHIEF RESPONDS TO MONTGOMERY

ZAGREB, Dec 10 (Hina) - The editor-in-chief of Croatian daily "Vjesnik", Nenad Ivankovic, on Friday reacted to accusations by the United States Ambassador to Croatia, William Montgomery, who said that "Vjesnik organised an anti-American campaign". Montgomery said that in an interview for Croatian television broadcast "Otvoreno" on Thursday evening. In Friday's statement, Ivankovic stressed that he could not remember a politician, let alone a foreign ambassador, attacking a newspaper in such an explicit and heated manner, as Montgomery did with "Vjesnik" on Thursday. The cause was trite, Ivankovic said, and added that "Vjesnik" published an article about ten days ago which approximately read that non-government institutions, financially and otherwise connected with the US government, were obviously trying to influence in a variety of ways the outcome of impending parliamentary elections and the change of the Government, and were doing so by displaying favouritism towards the Opposition and some media in Croatia. Ivankovic assessed that in any case "Vjesnik's" actions "were far less malicious than the past criminalisation of the circumstances and atmosphere in our country on the pages of the 'New York Times', or the obviously false broadcasts on CNN". The "Vjesnik" editor-in-chief said that Montgomery's accusations were "a truly low underestimation of 'Vjesnik's' circulation and the newspaper in its entirety". If the accusations were true, he wondered, "why did US State Department spokesman James Rubin find it necessary to publicly react to the article published in 'Vjesnik'?" Was it only because an insignificant newspaper, a relict of Communism, as Montgomery put it, published a pure fabrication which, due to poor circulation, no one had even read? (hina) it/ha mm