BELI MANASTIR, 21 May (Hina) - At 11 am today, the still occupied Baranja area entered Croatia's telecommunication system. Thirty channels with Osijek County area code have been re-established between Baranja and the rest of Croatia.
The re-establishment of the first phone link between Baranja and Croatia in the Beli Manastir post office was attended by the head of the UN Transitional Administration in eastern Slavonia, Baranja and western Srijem, General Jacques Paul Klein, the head of the government Office of the Temporary Administration for the Establishment of Croatian Authority in Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srijem, Ivica Vrkic and local Serb representatives Goran Hadzic and Borivoje Zivanovic.
BELI MANASTIR, 21 May (Hina) - At 11 am today, the still occupied
Baranja area entered Croatia's telecommunication system. Thirty
channels with Osijek County area code have been re-established
between Baranja and the rest of Croatia.
The re-establishment of the first phone link between Baranja
and Croatia in the Beli Manastir post office was attended by the
head of the UN Transitional Administration in eastern Slavonia,
Baranja and western Srijem, General Jacques Paul Klein, the head of
the government Office of the Temporary Administration for the
Establishment of Croatian Authority in Eastern Slavonia, Baranja
and Western Srijem, Ivica Vrkic and local Serb representatives
Goran Hadzic and Borivoje Zivanovic. #L#
The first phone call was made by UN officials from Zagreb who
phoned General Klein. Croatian Vice Premier Ivica Kostovic then
phoned from Osijek to thank General Klein and his associates for
helping the establishment of telecommunication links between
Baranja and the rest of Croatia.
General Klein and Ivica Vrkic then proposed to Goran Hadzic to
make a phone call to Osijek, but he refused it, saying that 'at
this moment he had no friend in Osijek whom he could phone'.
After the opening ceremony, Croatian journalists made phone
calls to their departments, and their first sentence was usually 'I
am calling from Beli Manastir'.
Josip Kompanovic, a refugee from Beli Manastir, who visited
his home for the first time since 1991, phoned the exiled Beli
Manastir Mayor Marko Kvesic in Osijek. 'Hi Marko, I am calling from
home', Kompanovic said.
Croatian reporters, who covered the re-establishment of the
first phone link between Baranja and Croatia, half an hour before
the beginning of the ceremony, talked with civilians and Serbian
journalists. They recognized many of their former friends among
people in the streets.
Some of those friends stopped to say hello, some remained on
the other side of the street, like one journalist who left Osijek
and went to Baranja some time ago.
One woman said: 'I am a Serb, but I know that the moment is
coming when Croatian authority will be re-established here'. Asked
whether she was glad about it, she said: 'To tell you the truth, I
am not happy with the situation here either and I do not care about
politics'.
(hina) rm jn
211711 MET may 96