AGREEMENT ON NEW STOLAC POLICE HEAD YET TO BE REACHED

( Editorial: --> 3321 ) MOSTAR, May 12 (Hina) - Croat and Bosniak officials of the Hercegovina-Neretva Canton Interior Ministry on Tuesday failed to agree on who will be the next police superintendent in Stolac, southern Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Croat and Bosniak officials met in Mostar to elect a successor to the Croat Mirko Boskovic, whose mandate expired yesterday. Stolac police now do not have a superintendent, Canton Interior Minister Valentin Coric told journalists after the meeting. The Bosniak side wants the Stolac police head to be a Bosniak. Coric believes this would be an illogical solution because there are about 300 Bosniaks and 10,000 Croats on the territory of the Stolac municipality. "I have suggested that the head of the Stolac police for the next six months be a Croat and after that we will discuss who will hold that office, in respect to the number of returnees," said Coric. Coric has found out that the International Police Task Force (IPTF) is insisting that the Stolac police head be chosen on the basis of the 1991 census. IPTF believe that the police head in Stolac should be a Bosniak because Bosniaks were a majority in that town, according to the 1991 census. Debated at today's meeting were also documents in the Herzegovina- Neretva Canton such as personal identity cards and drivers' licences. Coric recalled the recent ban on using documents of the former Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Croat Republic of Herceg-Bosna. The Croat side is suggesting that the documents have the insignia of Bosnia-Herzegovina and inscriptions of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina and Hercegovina-Neretva Canton. They have also suggested that the documents be written in the Croatian and Bosniak languages and that they do not have the coats- of-arms of the Croat or Bosniak peoples. The Bosniak side is also requesting the use of the Cyrillic script in those documents. However, Coric maintains that this would be a violation of the Federation Constitution, according to which the Latin script is the official script of the Federation. (hina) mrb/rm 121712 MET may 98