OSCE REVIEWING ELECTION RESULTS FOR MOSTAR CITY COUNCIL

MOSTAR, Oct 14 (Hina) - The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) office in Sarajevo is reviewing the results of elections for the Mostar City Council, the newly- appointed head of the OSCE Mostar office, David Foley, said on Tuesday. The Coalition for Unified and Democratic Bosnia-Herzegovina, led by the Moslem-dominated Party of Democratic Action (SDA), won 14 seats in the September 13-14 local elections for the 24-seat Council while the leading Bosnian Croat party, the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), won 10 seats, although the HDZ gained almost 12,000 votes more than the Coalition. That prompted the HDZ to lodge a complaint, arguing that election rules used in Mostar were not in conformity with general rules applied elsewhere in the country. Election rules for Mostar were known even before the elections and voter registration, Foley said. He did not say where there was a possibility of changing the number of seats in the City Council. The former head of the office, Edward Joseph, said that the process of implementing the election results in Mostar had begun on the day of their announcement, i.e. last Friday, and that new government bodies should be established within a period of thirty days. Joseph stressed the determination of the international community to implement the election results, threatening sanctions against all those who might attempt to block that process. (hina) vm jn 141855 MET oct 97