HRT: OSCE'S ACTION "UNFITTING"

( Editorial: --> 5139 ) ZAGREB, August 21 (Hina) - Croatian Radio and Television network (HRT) says that it will cover the elections in Bosnia-Hercegovina in a professsional manner. In a response to the OSCE directions relating to the manner of covering the election process, which it completely agrees with, the HRT management at the same time resents the way in which this institution has expressed its complaints. The Media Expert Commission (MEC), which is part of the OSCE mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina, requested that the HRT urgently change the manner in which it presents political parties participating in Bosnia-Herzegovina elections, and warned it would take punitive measures if their requirements were not met. In a letter to the MEC chairwoman, Tanja L. Doma, sent today by Obrad Kosovac on behalf of the HRT president Ivan Vrkic, the HRT claims that it will "professionally, objectively and equally" follow the activities of Croat political parties in Bosnia-Herzegovina, "as it always has". The HRT quotes its statistical data of the election campaign coverage in its response to the "messages, remarks and suggestions" of the MEC. The HRT management in its letter informs the MEC that it will, in compliance with the provisions of the Croatian constitution which requires it to cover the areas of life and work of Croats living outside Croatia, "in daily political broadcasts report informatively and in approximately equal length on gatherings and political activities of all nine Croat political parties registered for elections." In doing this, the HRT will follow MEC's directions and will not favour any party or candidate. However, the HRT emphasises that although its technical and staff conditions do not allow it to cover all political parties in Bosnian elections, it will do its best to present all parties in separate programmes which will be broadcast for the area of Bosnia- Herzegovina in prime time on its Channel One. The order will be determined by means of drawing, the procedure which will also be followed in the programmes the Erotel broadcasts for Bosnia- Herzegovina. The HRT resents MEC's incorrect procedure in submitting its request regarding the change of relations towards election campaign participants. It refers chiefly to the fact that the HRT received the request only today, after it was published in the media and reported that it had been made on Thursday. Furthermore, the HRT finds unfitting that such a message was sent from another country instead of through the OSCE office in Zagreb. The MEC head Tanja Domi said on Thursday in Sarajevo that the HRT had been required to ensure equal treatment of all Bosnia-Herzegovina political parties in prime-time news broadcasts by August 23 at the latest. Moreover, the HRT had to start presenting participating parties and candidates by August 26, the same as other TV networks in the country were doing, i.e. it had to determine by means of drawing the order of their appearance in broadcasts, which had to be at the same time and duration. Domi emphasised that such a request had been made because the previous talks with HRT representatives and Croatian authorities had not been successful, although they had been warned of the fact that the network favoured the Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia- Herzegovina (HDZ BiH). The reaching of the decision, said Domi, was based on demarches concerning the contents of the HRT broadcasts sent to the authorities in Zagreb earlier, after scrutinising the major news broadcasts in July and August. Robert Barry, the OSCE mission chief in Bosnia-Herzegovina, reminded of the fact that this body was authorised to remove candidates from the lists in case election rules and regulations were being disregarded. He also said that the OSCE mandate did not include physical obstructing of HRT broadcasts, but that it would, if Croatia fulfilled MEC's requirements, significantly influence the decision of the independent Media Expert Commission whether the HRT broadcasting would be allowed in Bosnia-Herzegovina after the elections. (hina) jfk/ 212105 MET aug 98