SARAJEVO, Dec 9 (Hina) - Economic reforms must be urgently +implemented in Bosnia-Herzegovina because the current situation +prevents any serious investments, United States special envoy for +the Balkans Robert Gelbard said on
Wednesday.+ Gelbard told a press conference in Sarajevo this referred first of +all to the beginning of the privatisation process and the reform of +wage and salary system. He added fresh help from abroad would not be +provided unless those conditions were fulfilled.+ The next donors' conference has not yet been scheduled, and in +upcoming months we will observe if the conditions will be +fulfilled, the U.S. diplomat said.+ He particularly stressed that the National Bank of the former +Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina must be eliminated as well as +bureaus for payment transactions which, according to him, was the +legacy from the communist system and an element of state +su
SARAJEVO, Dec 9 (Hina) - Economic reforms must be urgently
implemented in Bosnia-Herzegovina because the current situation
prevents any serious investments, United States special envoy for
the Balkans Robert Gelbard said on Wednesday.
Gelbard told a press conference in Sarajevo this referred first of
all to the beginning of the privatisation process and the reform of
wage and salary system. He added fresh help from abroad would not be
provided unless those conditions were fulfilled.
The next donors' conference has not yet been scheduled, and in
upcoming months we will observe if the conditions will be
fulfilled, the U.S. diplomat said.
He particularly stressed that the National Bank of the former
Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina must be eliminated as well as
bureaus for payment transactions which, according to him, was the
legacy from the communist system and an element of state
supervision over economy.
Gelbard said that Bosnian senior officials were resolute in
promising they would take necessary steps to change the current
situation.
Commenting on the situation in Republika Srpska, Gelbard repeated
the accusations he made in Banja Luka on Monday against the Bosnian
Serb entity's President Nikola Poplasen.
Poplasen is playing dangerous games and is a great disappointment
to the people in Republika Srpska and in Bosnia, said Gelbard.
He asserted Poplasen was deliberately creating the current
tensions, in an attempt to gain the power which belongs to the
Government which, said Gelbard, was very dangerous.
Gelbard pointed to the insistence on maintaining the unrealistic
exchange rate of the convertible mark and the Yugoslav dinar, which
made Serbia directly export its inflation to Republika Srpska.
The U.S. diplomat reiterated his commendations to what Bosnian Serb
Prime Minister Milorad Dodik had done so far. According to Gelbard,
Dodik was allegedly working on connecting the post and
telecommunications system in Republika Srpska with the one on the
state level.
The U.S. insisted on the use of a uniform dialling code for Bosnia-
Herzegovina, 387.
The next step will be disconnecting the mobile phone system in
Herzegovina which is connected to Zagreb, Gelbard concluded.
(hina) it/ha