During mopping-up operations in one of the populated areas, a cache with a large quantity of grenades and fire-arm cartridges was discovered. In another village 35 aviation gun shells were found and rendered harmless. According to the press centre on Wednesday paramilitary units also destroyed 15 illegal mini-petrol plants, thus bringing the total number of liquidated clandestine petrol plants to 120.

2 IGOR

Thank you for excellent example of barbaric mentality. Just 3000 military fatigues were intercepted in moscow, and you are ready to bomb the country?

And why do you think they should be used by Chechens - Georgia is large enough to demand extra 3,000 military fatigues. It does not have, after all, the size of Vatican, for which this military would have been indeed too large.

Henry Kissinger


Rambouillet agreement untenable

It is absurd to claim that economic prosperity of European Union, whose gross national profit is greater than American, depends on results in poor Kosovo and Metohija. That's even less truth concerning NATO's prosperity.


NATO's cohesion is above all endangered because it (Alliance) has bonded with an untenable Rambouillet agreement. It is only left to be seen how much it could be retained when the publicity reacts on a quantity and span of bombing and when it becomes obvious that long-term consequences of the current campaign are to be secured with the ground troops.


The document from Rambouillet was sold to the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which has rejected it at first, as an instrument to point all the NATO's force against Serbia and it might forced Milosevic to accelerate his retribution against KLA before bombs started to fall.


The document from Rambouillet is now risking pulling NATO's ground troops and USA in monitoring of the agreement which no side really wants. It was a hard mistake to give up the efforts for strengthening of the monitors already present in Kosovo and Metohija in favor of NATO's ground troops which wouldn't like no peace to keep there.


Serbs rejected Rambouillet because they have realized it as an introduction to the Kosovo's independence. They also understand the presence of NATO's troops as a kind of foreign occupation, the thing Serbia has always opposed to, as faced with Ottoman and Austrian empire, Hitler and Stalin, and even if they are forced with bombs to capitulate, it is hard to expect they would be willing to support such a result…


Speaking of KLA, its goal is the independence and not autonomy. It has accepted the Rambouillet agreement as a tactical instrument to point NATO's air power against Serbs that they hate. Because of that, KLA is less willing to accept autonomy under Serbian rule now that Serbia is that much weakened with the NATO's air campaign.


KLA wouldn't give up their arms to NATO's troops, which wouldn't have any local support if they fight against KLA in order to disarm it. Nor would KLA peacefully accept Serbian troops to guard the border in Kosovo and Metohija.


What ever the result might be, deploying of some NATO's troops, weather in Kosovo or in Macedonia, would be necessary, not as much to keep the peace as to prevent extending of the conflict in Balkans. I have been constantly warning of that result, a consequence of hesitating and confusion. NATO has a little choice now if it intends to avoid war.


("BETA" news agency, April 5, 1999)

2 IGOR,

Are you employed in this "Infocenter"? If so, congratulations!! I very much wonder who kind of "expert" did the expertise. Maybe, the same who put drugs in the bag of M. Eismont in Vnukovo airport (do you know the story?). Chip Russian tricks!

If you are so fond of the Inforenter7s propaganda, why not you copy-paste their statement about Radio Liberty videos?

You are naieve balalaika.Oh no the U.S. couldn't be supplying terrorists could they.

AT STAKE IN CLINTON'S IMPEACHMENT IS THE ROLE OF THE MEDIA.

When one speaks of the rule of men versus the rule of law, make no mistake, THE RULE OF MEN TODAY MEANS THE RULE OF THE MEDIA. Those who control the media are accountable to no one. Their increasing power to shape public opinion and thereby determine who shall rule is the greatest challenge to representative democracy.

Supported by the media, Bill Clinton will not resign. He will not step down and save the nation the ordeal and humiliation of an impeachment trial in the Senate. And since it will be very difficult to muster the two­third vote required for his conviction, Clinton will continue in office. His "acquittal" will make a mockery of equal justice under law, will undermine respect for truth, will augment the power of the media, hence will damage the foundations of the American polity.

BEHIND THE HEADLINES
Chechen gangs kill hostages,
release one Israeli teen-ager
By Lev Gorodetsky


MOSCOW, Dec. 27 (JTA) — As Russian troops assault the Chechen capital of Grozny, the fate of several hundred hostages, including some Jews, being held by Chechen gangs is becoming increasingly grim.

Retired Maj. Vyacheslav Izmailov, who has managed to arrange the release of dozens of hostages, puts it very simply, "They are going to kill the hostages. It is going on already."

It is believed that the gangs, part of a rebel movement desperately fighting against Russian troops for control of Chechnya, are starting to kill their captives because they no longer believe that they will receive the ransoms they once expected.

Lev Melikhov, a 52-years-old Jew from the city of Nalchik, has evidently been killed by his captors, even though the Chechens are still telling his family he is alive in order to get a ransom, said Izmailov.

Izmailov is concerned about the fate of Oleg Yemelyantsev, an Israeli citizen who has been held hostage for more than 20 months.

Recently Yemelyantsev's relatives received video footage of his finger being chopped off.

"They are transferring him all the time from one place to another," said Izmailov. "I can't locate his whereabouts now."

But the squads working to free hostages have managed during the last weeks to free several dozen hostages, including some foreigners and some children

Laura Lichtman, 18, an Israeli citizen who was kidnapped in July in the city of Nalchik, was released and expected to return home this week. Lichtman was abducted during a visit to her grandmother, who lives on the border between Russia and Georgia.

She had been held in the Chechen capital of Grozny, but after Russian troops started massive air raids of the city, her captors took her out of the city, and she spent the last part of her captivity in a mountain village of Chechnya.

Another teen-ager, Alla Geifman, 13, was freed earlier this month in the south of Chechnya.

Geifman, the daughter of banker Grigory Geifman, one of the wealthiest businessmen and an active member of the Jewish community in the city of Saratov in southern Russia, was abducted in May near her house by a gang that specializes in kidnappings of children from upper-class families.

The kidnappers demanded a ransom of $5 million. Grigory Geifman collected a part of the sum and sent a man with the money. The man was killed and the money disappeared.

When he failed to produce the next payment, the mobsters cut off two of the girl's fingers and sent them to her father with video footage of the act.

This gang, which is made up both of Chechens and individuals from southern Russia, is still holding several other children.

Jews in Saratov who are selling their apartments before they leave for Israel are particular targets.

Mikhail Zeigman, 71, a retired soldier, was murdered earlier this month in his apartment. Zeigman, who was planning to leave for Israel in several days, had sold his apartment for $10,000. He was found with his head crushed with a sharp instrument, and the money was stolen.

This was the second such case of murder in a short period, and the local staff of the Jewish Agency for Israel has even started to work with potential emigres to teach them a system of "security precautions."

(© Jewish Telegraphic Agency Inc. The above information is available on a read-only basis and cannot be reproduced without permission from JTA.)

http://www.nandotimes.com/noframes/story/0,2107,500147561-500178250-500713046-0,00.html

2 IGOR,

(© Jewish Telegraphic Agency Inc. The above information is available on a read-only basis and cannot be reproduced without permission from JTA.)

Do not steal intellectual property - it is copy-righted and could not be copied. Or you have asked JTA for permission?

Russian Minister Visits Yugoslavia
By Dusan Stojanovic
Associated Press Writer
Thursday, Dec. 23, 1999; 6:57 p.m. EST

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia –– The Yugoslav president and Russia's defense minister exchanged medals of friendship and heroism Thursday, and accused the West of failing in its peace mission in Kosovo.

A statement from President Slobodan Milosevic's office after his meeting with Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev accused NATO members of continuing a policy of "violating Yugoslavia's legitimate rights, peace and stability in the region."

It charged that the West had violated the U.N. agreement regarding Yugoslavia's southern province and that international officials were "aiding ethnic cleansing" of non-Albanians from Kosovo.

"Yugoslavia and Russia consider the present situation in Kosovo unsustainable," the statement said. It called on the United Nations to step in and allow the return of Yugoslav army and police forces to the province.

NATO-led peacekeepers arrived in Kosovo in June following a 78-day bombing campaign to halt Milosevic's crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists.

Western governments and international human rights groups have assailed Moscow in recent weeks for its own bombing campaign in the Russian breakaway province of Chechnya. In light of Kosovo, the Kremlin has called that criticism hypocritical.

Russia has said it would not bow to Western demands to moderate its campaign against Chechen rebels, whom it calls terrorists, and Sergeyev did not hesitate to throw his support behind Milosevic Thursday.

The Russian defense minister also bestowed awards on Yugoslav army chiefs for their "heroic defense of the country," the state-run Tanjug news agency reported.

Among those decorated was Yugoslav army chief of staff, Gen. Dragoljub Ojdanic, who along with Milosevic has been indicted by the International War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands.

"The NATO aggressor did not dare undertake a land operation, fully aware of the strength and determination of your army," Sergeyev was quoted by Tanjug as saying while handing out the medals.

Earlier Thursday, at a ceremony at Milosevic's residence in Belgrade, the Yugoslav president decorated Sergeyev with medals for promoting cooperation between the two countries and their armies.

Sergeyev arrived in Yugoslavia on a two-day visit for what Russian media said would be tough talks with U.N. and NATO officials in Kosovo on the way they were doing their jobs.

He met Thursday with Milosevic and his army commanders, who are looking for help in repairing damage caused to the military by NATO airstrikes.

Milosevic has criticized the international Kosovo mission for its failure to protect minority Serbs in the province from retaliatory ethnic Albanian attacks, and Sergeyev said Thursday, "events over the past few months prove that what is happening in Kosovo is not peace."

Sergeyev's trip to Kosovo was scheduled for Friday. While in the province, he said he will meet German Defense Minister Rudolf Sharping to discuss military relations between the two countries.

© Copyright 1999 The Associated Press

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Is that all you got from that

2 Igor,

So what was the point of posting these articles about Yugoslavia? To show that Russia is not lonely?

Mr Sergeev may have not so much choice decorating his allies (like Milo as well). The only remaining option is to go to Bagdad where he can also make noice about West. Oops, I also forgot the North Korea and your Belorus brothers... Good company.

Balalaika,
Are you employed in this "Infocenter"? If so, congratulations!! I very much wonder who kind of "expert" did the expertise. Maybe, the same who put drugs in the bag of M. Eismont in Vnukovo airport (do you know the story?). Chip Russian tricks!
You started to sound cheap, dear. Or, maybe, You're just reflecting the ICSEAD's point?

2 Kissie,

? You started to sound cheap, dear. Or, maybe, You're just reflecting the ICSEAD's point?

Try to guess what I am reflecting.

We will hunt down and exterminate all those who started First and Second Chechen Wars!
Russian Military officers and their supporters will be eliminated!!

The WAR is just beginning!