SOLANA EXPRESSES BELIEF IN IMPARTIALITY OF SFOR

( Editorial: --> 9443 ) ZAGREB, Dec 18 (Hina) - NATO Secretary General Javier Solana telephoned Croatian President Franjo Tudjman on Thursday to report on a SFOR operation near Vitez which resulted in the capture of Vlatko Kupreskic and Anto Furundzija. Solana expressed his belief that SFOR would work impartially, despite the fact that both men arrested early this morning, among a wide list of war crimes suspects provided by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), were Bosnian Croats. At the same time the NATO Secretary General urged President Tudjman to help prevent any acts of revenge by Bosnian Croats because of today's arrests in central Bosnia, said a NATO source in Brussels on Thursday. The NATO representative said Solana emphasised how the operation was directed against people whom the Hague tribunal had accused of war crimes and not against Bosnian Croats. Meanwhile, a statement from the NATO Secretary General was released in Brussels which called on war crimes suspects to immediately and voluntarily hand themselves over to the ICTY. At the same time NATO continues to insist that parties which signed the peace agreement meet their obligations in full by handing over those accused of war crimes to the ICTY, reminded Solana. The NATO source in Brussels told Hina in a telephone interview that the large part of Croats accused of war crimes had been arrested and handed over to the Hague tribunal, and now the biggest pressure was on the Bosnian Serbs but he did not want to elaborate on eventual actions SFOR would take in the future. To date the ICTY has indicted 77 people for committing war crimes, the overwhelming majority of them Bosnian Serbs. Among the 22 accused who are in the tribunal's custody, most are Croats and the occasional Moslem while 50 or so Serbs are still roaming free. Among them are the most notorious suspects of committing war crimes in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic. (Hina) mm mb 182201 MET dec 97