Military

SHAPE News Morning Update

23 June 2004

NATO

• Turkish security forces are using concrete barriers to seal off a zone in the heart of Istanbul. AWACS early warning aircraft are being prepared to help monitor a no-fly zone over the city, and the Bosporus will be closed to vital oil traffic. Scores of people believed to be linked to Islamic, Kurdish or leftist groups have been detained in security sweeps in recent weeks. “NATO is a prime target because NATO brings together allies that includes al-Qaida’s most hated Western foes,” said Jonathan Stevenson, a senior fellow for counter-terrorism at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. AWACS planes dispatched by NATO will help monitor a no-fly zone over the city, enforced by Turkey’s military. A Czech anti-chemical warfare unit will also be on duty in the city. (AP 221510 Jun 04)
  
  
• The German government denied a newspaper report that Defence Minister Struck was too sick to return to work after a recent heart scare. Chancellor Schroeder and Peter Struck had agreed during a brief conversation on Tuesday that the minister would return after his recovery, Mr. Schroeder’s spokesman said. In an article to be published in Wednesday’s Tagesspiegel newspaper government sources are quoted as saying Mr. Struck is not expected to return to his job and that the search has started for a successor. (Reuters 221923 GMT Jun 04)

IRAQ

• Hungary will keep its troops in Iraq despite violence there targeting allies of the United States, Hungarian Prime Minister Medgyessy said on Tuesday in Washington. Speaking to reporters after a meeting in the Oval Office with President Bush, Mr. Medgyessy told reporters: “I could confirm to the president that Hungary’s commitment to the presence in Iraq is unchanged. And we want to promote stabilization.” He also said he thought there was openness within Europe to an agreement among NATO members to help train Iraqi security forces. (Reuters 221918 GMT Jun 04)
  
  
• Italy’s cabinet approved a decree extending the mission of Italian soldiers in Iraq until the end of the year. The decree, which had been expected, also extended funding for missions of Italian military in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Somalia, Sudan and other places. (Reuters 221849 GMT Jun 04)
  
  
• The Dutch parliament overwhelmingly backed government plans to keep some 1,300 troops in Iraq until March 2005 as part of a multinational force, Dutch media reported. While polls indicate many Dutch oppose keeping troops in Iraq, little public opposition has emerged since Mr. Balkenende’s three-party coalition said it intended to extend the mandate earlier this month. (Reuters 222238 GMT Jun 04)

BALKANS

• The defence ministers of Albania and Serbia-Montenegro agreed Tuesday to cooperate in a landmark meeting signaling that decades of chilly relations have ended. Defence Minister Prvoslav Davinic’s visit to Tirana was the first by a Belgrade defence minister since 1947. His visit demonstrated that “the Cold War between Tirana and Belgrade” has ended and that the countries have begun “a new era in their relations,” Albanian Defence Minister Pandeli Majko told a news conference. In a joint statement with Mr. Davinic, he said that strengthening the relationship between the countries’ armed forces would reduce tension in the region. Both ministers were diplomatic in answering questions about Kosovo, saying they had no authority to decide its future status. (AP 221816 Jun 04)
  
  
• The United Nations on Tuesday relaunched a stalled privatisation process in Kosovo seen as crucial to creating jobs and defusing tensions in the province it has run for the past five years. Nikolaus Lambsdorff, the head of the European Union wing of the UN’s Kosovo mission, said he had asked the EU-run Kosovo Trust Agency to immediately launch a third wave of tenders. The privatisation of some 500 companies was suspended last October after concerns about its legality. (Reuters 221806 GMT Jun 04)
  
  
• Some 1,500 Serbs and other Kosovo minorities have still not returned to their homes three months after ethnic Albanian riots, the United Nations said on Tuesday. The mid-March violence, in which 19 people were killed and more than 800 Serb homes set ablaze, has also been followed by a 35 percent drop in rate of return to Kosovo by refugees who fled Albanian revenge attacks in 1999 after NATO forces moved in. (Reuters 221557 GMT Jun 04)
  
  
• Croatia has improved its handling of war crimes trials but more reforms are needed to ensure all defendants are tried fairly, a European rights watchdog said on Tuesday. The report from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe said that progress made could allow the UN war crimes tribunal for ex-Yugoslavia in The Hague to transfer some cases to the Croatian judiciary. (Reuters 221239 GMT Jun 04)
  
  
• The Bosnian Serb president expressed regret for the 1995 massacre of thousands of Muslims at Srebrenica, calling it “a dark page of Serb history” in his first public address about Bosnian Serb responsibility for the killings during the civil war. But Dargan Cavic did not apologize for what was the worst massacre of civilians on European soil since World War II. His address marked the first time a top official told the public directly of the findings since the commission’s report was adopted by the parliament two weeks ago. (AP 230233 Jun 04)

ICC

• The United States, in a compromise move, floated a proposal to seek just one more renewal of a UN resolution exempting American solders from international prosecution, diplomats said on Tuesday. But it was uncertain whether the proposed change in the resolution on the International Criminal Court would be enough to win UN Security Council approval due to international fury over prisoner abuse at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib detention center. (Reuters 222335 GMT Jun 04)