FEDERATION PARLIAMENT ADOPTS SERB DECLARATION WITHOUT CROAT REPS

( Editorial: --> 7149 ) SARAJEVO, 9 Dec (Hina) - The House of Representatives of the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina on Tuesday adopted a declaration of the Serb Civic Council of Bosnia-Herzegovina, which asks for the recognition of the constituent status of Serbs in the Federation, and the recognition of the constituent status of Croats and Muslims in Republika Srpska. The document, entitled 'Declaration on the Human Right to Political and National Equality' was adopted with the majority vote, after a short, but without representatives of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) of Bosnia-Herzegovina, who left the session during the discussion on that item of the agenda. HDZ President Bozo Rajic said that the discussion on that question actually meant the repeated discussion on the Dayton agreement, which the Croat side was not willing to accept. Before opening such a discussion one should ask the Constitutional Court, or the Legislative-Legal Commission of the Federation Parliament for opinion, he said. Representatives of the Muslim Party of Democratic Action (SDA) and opposition parties ignored Rajic's warning, saying that the issue of constituent status of the three peoples in the whole of Bosnia- Herzegovina has already been solved in the preamble to the Bosnian Constitution from Dayton and that there is nothing disputable in adjusting entity constitutions to that regulation. (hina) rm 092223 MET dec 97