PRESS CONFERENCE BY OSCE ELECTION DIRECTOR

SARAJEVO, Sept 14 (Hina) - The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) mission said on Saturday that all polling stations in Bosnia-Herzegovina opened according to schedule at 7.00 hours and that voting in the area covered by the OSCE Sarajevo office was running smoothly. Only a small number of people were not found on electoral lists and they were sent to local election commissions to verify their registration, the OSCE mission's director general for elections, Jeff Fisher, told a news conference in Sarajevo. According to the latest OSCE report, about 60 percent of some 3,000 members of the armed forces and police turned out for the vote held on Friday. Fisher said that a hand grenade had been thrown at the home of the Croat chairman of the election commission in the western town of Bugojno at 20.00 hours on Friday. The attack prompted the local branch of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) party to withdraw its representatives from the election commission. OSCE and HDZ officials were holding a meeting to solve the problem. However, voting in Bugojno was proceeding normally despite the incident, Fisher said. IFOR spokesman Bratt Boudreau said that Serb police in the northeastern town of Brcko were preventing voters from crossing the Sava river bridge from Croatia. He said that negotiations were under with local Serb authorities to lift the blockade. According to unconfirmed reports, the chief of police in the northwestern Serb-held town of Prijedor had ordered the voter route into town to blocked. (hina) vm 141145 MET sep 96