INTERIOR MINISTER PENIC VISITS PREVLAKA

( Vidi vijest: 6153 ) DUBROVNIK, Oct 27 (Hina) - Croatian Interior Minister Ivan Penic held a news conference in Dubrovnik on Monday after having visited the Croatian southernmost peninsula of Prevlaka. The UN monitoring mission is being carried out the moment on the peninsula which has been a demilitarised area since the withdrawal of the then Yugoslav People's Army (JNA). Penic, along with his assistants Josko Moric and Mladen Markac, and the Dubrovnik-Neretva County Police chief, Eduard Cengija, addressed the conference. The Interior Minister described the visit to Prevlaka as successful. He added that he had talked with the UN mission representatives and agreed with them on de-mining a road in the area. The Croatian party showed that it was willing to discuss, with Montenegro and Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the permanent demilitarisation of this part of the Croatian border on the reciprocal basis, Penic said. He told reporters that Croatia and the UN monitors had agreed that the Croatian company "Plovput" would service and maintain the lighthouse on the peninsula in the future. We demanded that civilians can come to the cape of Ostro and cultivate their land, but UN representatives rejected the request, Penic told reporters. Assistant Minister Josko Moric said an initiative was launched for concluding talks on the border crossing at Debeli Brijeg between Croatia and Montenegro, and explained that the Yugoslav party had not showed good will for the settlement of this issue to date. On Friday, 31 October, delegations of the Croatian and Yugoslav interior ministries are due to meet and discuss the technique of the negotiating process on the local border traffic and the border crossing at Debeli Brijeg. Assistant Minister Mladen Markac said that the control of the Croatian border in the Dubrovnik area would be intensified in order to cut down the number of cases of the illegal passing of the border, and added that there had been 36 such cases this year when 96 people tried to pass the border illegally in this area. (hina) jn mš 271852 MET oct 97