Advertising

For weeks now, every block of TV advertising on all the stations in Belgrade has featured a commercial for Greek pastry, i.e. the Greek pastry shop in Novi Sad. The story wouldn't be sweet even if it wasn't about sweets since the commercial has a perfect racist concept which would prevent its screening anywhere else. Its starts with a view of the pastry shop full of everything, then a dark skinned child (Gypsy or Romany whatever you prefer) steals a cake and eats it so greedily that you get turned off, then a man grabs the kid by the ear and demands to know why he's stealing and the boy replies: "they're the best cakes in the world".

Disregard the fact that in the commercial terms that rule this market the ad is acceptable and you're left with the racist angle which says: of course the kid is a gypsy because gypsies steal and lie. Also, it's understood that gypsies don't eat in Greek pastry shops but satisfy their need for sweets by stealing.

 

Offer

The Belgrade university law school notice board had a typed note from Zeljko Raznatovic Arkan's Serbian Unity Party (SSJ) which said: "The youth organization of the SSJ has the job of rallying young people (age 18 to 30) around the ideas of:

- the unity of the Serb people and development of democracy,

- the uniting of all Serb lands into a single state,

- equality of all citizens regardless of the race, nationality or religion

- the quickest economic development of our community based on a free market, private property and the abilities of people.

The SSJ youth organization will provide young people with the means to communicate, cooperate and associate among themselves, help in getting jobs and choosing a suitable occupation (during education), intellectual aid (in the form of lectures), everything in our power that can be useful to young people. By joining our family you become an important part of it that the whole party will take care of!"

Future lawyers have been given an opportunity to join the party and get to know the academy of sciences and other institutions and be taken care of by the entire party, to say nothing of the communication the party is famed for.

 

Control

The fuss over the fake inspectors who robbed a sizable amount of money in Belgrade's public transport system hasn't died down a new case of vandalism in public transport has got people talking.

Studio B TV taped it and Politika Ekspres reported the story of the beating of tram passengers near Sava Center but warned that the reasons why the inspectors and passengers clashed weren't clear yet. Several passengers got hit, one woman was seriously injured. We don't know if the inspectors were real or fakes. One of the passengers who was attacked said the young man who said he was an inspector produced an ID card with the number 229 and took several people off the tram along with his colleagues to punch them around: "They hit them on the hands, legs, face and body."

Public transport managers said these might have been their people but would not provide more information until the investigation is over.

The punishment, if they were real inspectors, ranges from a 10% cut in pay to loss of job.

 

Letter

Argument weekly reported that a group of TV Novi Sad employees published an open letter about activities in the station. Interestingly, the group of employees is anonymous which ads flavor to the story. In the letter, they first complained of the offensive of Vojvodina reformist party supporters who are allegedly taking over the station in a coalition with the Socialists. The letter said the group wasn't happy about that because "at the start of the war the reformists supported the Moslems and Croats and tried to find allies in the EU to create a Vojvodina state".

The letter disclosed national segregation: "Most employees, especially people in sensitive jobs as broadcasters or technical staff and producers, are taken mainly by Hungarians, Slovaks, Germans or Croats. Alongside them are the Yugo-communist autonomy advocates who have been systematically indoctrinated to become central European mutants."

If you were wondering how to recognize the mutants the letter explained who they are: "They can be recognized by the hatred of refugee Serbs who they blame for every evil in the world. They're nostalgic for the time of Tito and they hate Belgrade."

Finally, the letter reveals the position of Serbs in TV Novi Sad: "The humiliating status of part time staff is reserved for the Serb minority at the station. Some exceptional professionals have bee part time staff for years and their salaries are months late. That group is ethnically pure Serb."

 

Frogs

Frogs, snails and leaches can relax. They have the backing of none other than the competent Serbian ministry. Whoever is caught catching frogs in the Belgrade area this year is in for a bad time: there's a fine that can buy a kilogram of frogs and if the judge is strict he can set the fine at 10 times that amount. The same rule applies for anyone caught picking blueberries in the Prizren area and mushrooms and a certain type of root in the Zlatibor area and snail hunters in the Danube region.

That is the essence of the instructions on controlling the gathering and sales of mushrooms, snails, leaches, frogs and medicinal herbs issued by the environmental ministry last week. It also sets the period when wild animals and plants can be collected. Snails can be hunted only between June 1 and October 1.

 

Resignations and Hare Krishna

The Bosnian presidency could disappear before the next elections, Svijet weekly said. Ivo Komsic has submitted his resignation and Nijaz Skenderagic of the SDP announced some other members might leave. It wasn't clear whether he meant his party boss Nijaz Durakovic but that move could be expected. Stjepan Kljuic and the Pejanovic-Mijatovic duo won't see the next elections as members of the dying presidency.

In about two weeks, Haris Silajdzic could register his party. The assessment is that the Hare Krishna, as Sarajevans are calling his party, could count on a number of unhappy SDA members. The Serb Civil Council is also thinking of registering as a party.

Fikret Abdic registered his new party - the Democratic People's Union - in Mostar.

 

Seagull and Limits

Several days after the start of the season in the KPGT theater, Ljubisa Ristic, the ideological and artistic leader of the company, got a ban. Richard Bach's legal representative feels Ristic should abandon his production of Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Ristic didn't get excited. We'll change the title, he said. The play hasn't got anything to do with Bach's novel anyway.

 

New Party

The Montenegrin justice ministry registered the Serbian Radical Party "Vojislav Seselj" on February 27. The party was formed when the parliament mandates of eight SRS members expired and is chaired by Acim Visnjic.

 

New Ambassadors

VREME could get neither confirmation nor denial of reports that Montenegrin President Momir Bulatovic and FRY Foreign Minister Milan Milutinovic agreed to give Montenegrins the Yugoslav embassies in London, Switzerland and the Netherlands. They agreed during a meeting in Podgorica to appoint Milos Radulovic, speaker of the federal parliament chamber of republics, ambassador to London, republican Foreign Minister Janko Jeknic ambssador to Geneva, and Branislav Srdanovic, Bulatovic's foreign policy advisor, ambassador to the Hague.

 

Trebinje Overbooked

"It's hard to find precise figures on the number of Serbs who sought shelter in six Herzegovina communities following Dayton," Danilo Capin, refugee commissioner in Trebinje, told VREME. He said they know that there are at least 3,000 and that every facility has been filled, every Moslem and Croat house, every building under construction and ruined buildings that are a risk to live in.

Under a decision by the government of the Bosnian Serb republic, Herzegovina is the destination of Ilidza Serbs. If those people really do have to leave Ilidza, Capin said, it could become a real humanitarian catastrophe since we can only provide first aid and housing in barracks and nothing else.

 

Partnership for the FRY

Dusan Mihajlovic (ND) renewed his idea on the FRY joining NATO's Partnership For Peace program at a round table with politicians, international relations experts and members of the diplomatic corps. The communists attacked the idea and even some socialists frowned.

The most interesting event at the round table was an explanation in favor of the concept by Admiral Miodrag Jokic (former Serbian defence minister). He said the geo-political reality has changed, that we are no longer a buffer zone and that we don't need to keep a distance from both blocs. That the US is the strongest world power in the long term, that Germany is the main European power and that our European position can't be built on resistance to that power, that our environment is included in the western security system with part of our neighbors in NATO, part in Partnership and part under direct NATO protection.

Jokic said the Serb national question can no longer be the cause of war between Serbia and Croatia and that the vital interests of Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Macedonia impose good neighbor relations. If Albania gives up its ideas of redrawing the Balkans, relations with that country could be normalized as well. In short, by joining Partnership the FRY would eliminate the danger of war in the long term.

To Russia, we are only important in terms of strategic position in case of a confrontation with the West and if Russia joins Partnership there isn't a single reason for us not to since it would strengthen, not weaken our security. It would be a certain limit of sovereignty, which causes a negative mood, but it's clear that a number of military limitations will be imposed. Also, with the exception of China and the US, every country has accepted some form of limitation.