OSCE: HTV BEGINS TO RESPECT ELECTION REGULATIONS

( Editorial: --> 8929 ) SARAJEVO, Sept 8 (Hina) - A spokeswoman for the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) mission to Bosnia- Herzegovina on Tuesday said that Croatian Television (HTV) programmes had begun to respect election regulations related to media presentation for the B-H elections. The OSCE mission's Nicole Szulc said monitoring in the past 24 hours had shown that HTV balanced its coverage of parties participating in the elections without favouring any particular group. Szulc said that the OSCE mission was satisfied with this approach and that it had advised the Electoral Appeals Sub-Commission (EASC) in this regard. The Mission had earlier threatened that it would remove Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia-Herzegovina (HDZ BiH) candidates from electoral lists if HTV did not respect the electoral procedures and regulations set for the media. The OSCE spokeswoman on Tuesday said that HDZ BiH president Ante Jelavic had given a firm promise during a meeting with the OSCE Mission head Robert Barry that his party would not boycott the coming elections. We are quite satisfied that all the registered parties will participate in the elections, Szulc said. She also said that special directions had been forwarded to the foreign ministries of Croatia and Yugoslavia with regard to the election blackout, which takes effect 24 hours prior to the opening of polling booths as these countries broadcast their programmes in B-H. Media Experts Commission (MEC) chairwoman Tanja Domi requested Foreign Ministers Mate Granic, of Croatia, and Zivadin Jovanovic, of Yugoslavia, for their respective governments' support so that the regulations would be completely adhered to. UN spokeswoman Kelly Moore on Tuesday stated that the local police in B-H had been issued with special directives regarding procedures during the two days of elections. She said that the police must ensure full freedom of movement in the entire country and that check points were not to be placed on thoroughfares. The police will not be allowed to spend time around polling booths and will not be allowed to conduct searches of citizens who come to vote. Moore said that the forensic team with the international war crimes tribunal had temporarily stopped its current work in exhuming mass graves in the Srebrenica region. She explained that this measure was taken for security reasons, based on an agreement between the SFOR command and The Hague tribunal because the NATO soldiers who usually guarded the investigative group would be required for other duties during the two-day elections. The exhumation of mass graves will continue immediately after the elections, Moore added. (Hina) sp jn /mbr 081556 MET sep 98