WASHINGTON, BELGRADE, Friday, May 31, 2002 – US President George W. Bush issued a decree yesterday extending for another year special measures against Yugoslavia, set in place in 1992.
Bush blamed the unresolved crisis in Kosovo, Belgrade’s record of cooperation with the UN war crimes tribunal and the unresolved status of blocked assets in the US.
Severe sanctions were imposed on Yugoslavia by the US in May 1992. In January 2001, three months after Slobodan Milosevic was ousted from power, President Bill Clinton issued a decree dismantling the “outer wall” of economic sanctions.
Clinton’s decree, however, maintains a ban on entry visas and all business transactions with Yugoslav citizens accused of war crimes or linked to the Milosevic regime, be it through business or politics.
Yugoslavia’s foreign minister branded the decree “confusing” and said it bore little resemblance to the substance of talks in the US State Department.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell recently lifted a freeze on economic aid to Belgrade after several concrete steps in cooperation with the Hague tribunal.
Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic said the tone of Bush’s decree had changed little from that adopted toward the Milosevic regime.
“I still think that the vocabulary used is far from what we heard in Washington, from the current relations between the US and Yugoslavia. It’s the vocabulary used in 1999, applied to the then regime,” Svilanovic told B92.
“It’s difficult to link these words with the current situation in Yugoslavia and the work of both republics’ governments and the federal administration," he added.
The foreign minister said he had been unable to get a sufficient explanation from either the Yugoslav embassy in Washington or the US ambassador in Belgrade.
Svilanovic said he was sure the decree was simply a matter of course. “I have the impression the State Department was unaware this decree was being prepared,” he said, adding that it would not stop the process of unfreezing Yugoslav assets.
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