NOBILO ON NEW UN MANDATE IN CROATIA

ZAGREB, April 1 (Hina) - "This resolution is so far the best in a political sense because it emphasizes Croatia's basic interests - sovereignty and territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders" Croatia's Ambassador to the U.N., Mario Nobilo, said in his telephone report from New York for Croatian Television last night. "This resolution goes even further - it says that the principle of sovereignty should be actualized through border control mechanisms. It has set up a political framework for the new operation, and its details have to be specified in negotiations over the next three weeks, after which the U.N. Secretary General is expected to submit his report", Nobilo said. The idea was to transform a passive mandate into a more active one, concentrating on the enforcement of the reintegration process already in place. The aim of the process was to create more favourable conditions for a final political solution in Croatia, Nobilo explained. He stressed that the success of the new mandate depended also on Knin, but most of all on Belgrade authorities. Asked why exactly the name of the mandate provoked such a hot dispute, and what was the aim of Russian diplomacy, Nobilo said that the Croatian delegation had been persistent and succeeded in its effort to add the word 'Croatia' to the name of the new mandate - United Nations Confidence Restoration Operation in Croatia (UNCRO). With its stubborn rejection of the word 'Croatia' as part of the operation's name, the Russian delegation had favoured the interests of the Serbian side, whose policy was to refuse anything that bore the name 'Croatia'. "The whole text of the resolution is so clear on all matters concerning borders, reintegration and sovereignty of Croatia that it was ridiculous to block the whole process because of something that is self-evident and usual in naming operations -it is a fact that they always contain the name of the country on whose territory the operation is being carried out", said Nobilo. (hina) as rm 011325 MET apr 95