BOSNIAN SERBS START BUILDING "BERLIN WALL" IN SARAJEVO

( Editorial: --> 0810 ) SARAJEVO, Feb 10 (Hina) - About 200 Serbs started building a wall between the Muslim-Croat Federation and Serb-controlled parts of Sarajevo on Tuesday afternoon. By the early afternoon hours, the Serbs built a 5m-long and almost 2m-high wall, threatening to continue building the wall unless Goran Vasic is immediately released. Vasic was arrested at the end of last week on Federation territory as the main suspect in the 1993 killing of war-time Bosnian Vice Premier Hakija Turajlic. However, circumstances of his arrest have not been established yet and the International Police Task Force (IPTF) is conducting an investigation into the case. UN spokesman in Sarajevo Alexander Ivanko said today that the evidence concerning the case had been sent to the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY), so that it could be established whether a trial based on a war crimes indictment was justified. According to Ivanko, the ICTY can decide to ask that Vasic be handed over and be tried in The Hague for a war crime, or it can confirm that there is a basis for instigating a legal procedure against him in Bosnia-Herzegovina. However, The Hague Tribunal can also decide that there is no sufficient evidence for any procedure against Vasic. The organiser of today's protest meeting, Dragan Savic, asked that Vasic be taken over from Sarajevo police "at least by the IPTF". The protesters also demanded the replacement of Sarajevo Canton Interior Minister Ismet Dahic. Stabilisation Force (SFOR) members watched the building of the wall from a distance. At one moment, the IPTF deputy commissioner Werner Schumm arrived at the site. UN spokesman Ivanko told Hina that the IPTF would ask local Serb police to secure freedom of movement on the road between Sarajevo and the suburb of Lukavica. If this is not done, the request will be furthered to SFOR, Ivanko said. (hina) jn rm 101645 MET feb 98