Cluster Bomb Charge Stings Kyiv, New Balkan Governments in the Offing
Cluster Bomb Charge Stings Kyiv, New Balkan Governments in the Offing
Plus, Hungary proposes a tax on Internet data and Tajikistan claims it foiled a major Islamist terror attack.
by Ky Krauthamer, Barbara Frye, Jack Nicholson, and Anders Ryehauge 22 October 2014
1. Kyiv denies using cluster bombs against civilians
As Ukrainian authorities try to deflect reports its forces have used cluster bombs against civilians, the allegations could further damage relations between the Kyiv authorities and beleaguered civilians in the conflict zone, Radio Free Europe writes.
Human Rights Watch said it “documented widespread use of cluster munitions in fighting between government forces and pro-Russian rebels in more than a dozen urban and rural locations” in a report released 20 October.
“While it was not possible to conclusively determine responsibility for many of the attacks, the evidence points to Ukrainian government forces’ responsibility for several cluster munitions attacks on Donetsk,” HRW claims.
Although Ukraine has not signed an international convention banning the use of cluster munitions, their use on civilians may qualify as a war crime, HRW says.
Cluster bombs are packages of small bomblets that burst in mid-air sending pieces of shrapnel over an area the size of a football field, according to Al Jazeera. The United States, Russia, and China are among a minority of countries not to have signed the 2008 convention.
A spokesman for Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, Andriy Lysenko, denied the report, according to the Kyiv Post.
Ukrainian troops have not used “any kind of weapons banned by international treaties. This includes use of cluster bombs,” Lysenko said 21 October.
He accused separatists of using the banned weapons and said Ukrainian forces on 13 October found four unexploded cluster bombs fired by separatists.
HRW’s report says the weight of the evidence points to the bombs being used by government forces but admits “anti-government forces might also have been responsible for the use of cluster munitions.”
“There is particularly strong evidence that Ukrainian government forces were responsible for several cluster munitions attacks on central Donetsk in early October,” the report says. In 12 incidents it documented, at least six people were killed and “dozens” injured, according to HRW.
In a 20 October article The New York Times makes similar charges, writing that cluster-bomb-carrying rockets that hit Donetsk on 2 and 5 October appeared to have been fired “from the direction of army-held territory.”
“If confirmed, the use of cluster bombs by the pro-Western government could complicate efforts to reunite the country, as residents of the east have grown increasingly bitter over the Ukrainian Army’s tactics to oust pro-Russian rebels,” The Times writes.
2. Old, new faces jockey for power in aftermath of Bosnian elections
Bosnia’s largest Serb party has called on the other two winning parties in recent elections to hold talks on forming a central government, Balkan Insight reports.
The Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD) emerged as the top vote-getter in the Serb-led Republika Srpska entity in the 12 October elections. In the Bosniak-Croat Federation entity, the Bosniak Party of Democratic Action (SDA) dealt a surprise defeat to the Social Democrats, long the strongest party in the Federation.
The Croatian Democratic Union took most votes among the smallest of Bosnia’s three main ethnic groups and is expected to join the SNSD-led talks.
The Social Democrats’ loss to the more nationalist SDA does not necessarily signal a return to hard-line attitudes among Bosniaks, the Economist editorializes, noting that a new party, the Democratic Front, emerged as an alternative for urban and middle-class voters disenchanted with the existing parties.
Milorad DodikAnd while the secession-minded Milorad Dodik was re-elected president of Republika Srpska, he suffered at the polls, the Economist notes. His SNSD may not be able to form the next entity government, and his chosen candidate for the three-person presidency has probably lost to Mladen Ivanic, “a politician associated with a period of progress that ended in 2006.”
With 93 percent of the vote counted, Ivanic was 2,000 votes ahead of SNSD candidate Zeljka Cvijanovic, Balkan Insight reported 20 October.
Bakir Izetbegovic and Dragan Covic easily won election to represent the Bosniak and Croat communities, respectively, on the presidency.
Bosnia’s constitution stipulates that the presidency be held by one representative of each of the three main ethnic communities. No representative of any other ethnic group may hold the largely ceremonial post.
The 10-person cabinet, or Council of Ministers, must include three ministers from each of main groups and one from the “others” category, including minorities and those who choose not to declare an ethnicity, Balkan Insight writes.
3. Bulgaria one step closer to government coalition
Bulgaria’s once-and-future governing party GERB is moving closer to forming a coalition with up to four other parties, The Sofia Globe reports.
Boyko BorisovGERB leader Boyko Borisov held unannounced talks with the center-right Reformist Bloc 21 October, a day after GERB said it would consult the Reformist Bloc, Bulgarian Socialist Party, Patriotic Front, and a socialist splinter party, ABC, on the possibility of forming a new coalition.
GERB, also a center-right party, came first in the 5 October elections but failed to secure a parliamentary majority.
The Reformist Bloc – an alliance of five smaller parties – was reportedly open for future talks with the Patriotic Front and ABC but “strongly opposed” inclusion of the Socialist Party in the coalition.
Borisov and his GERB-led government stepped down in May 2013 amid public protests over rising utility bills, corruption, and other issues, making way for a weak Socialist-led government that resigned in July after months of teetering. A nonpartisan caretaker government has been in charge since August.
President Rosen Plevneliev said 20 October it was necessary for parties to form a “functioning parliament and government” and ruled out another early election if they could not, Standart reports.
The depth of public ire against the carousel of scandal-scarred governments comes through in the pollster Gallup’s latest “Global State of Mind” survey, released this week. As the The Sofia Globe reports, Bulgaria’s government had the second-lowest approval rating among “partly free” countries surveyed, just 13 percent.
Bosnia’s government came last in the group with a paltry 8 percent approval rating. The Czech government fared worst among “free” countries, as classified by international democracy watchdog Freedom House, with a 15 percent rating.
4. Central Asian media jittery over terrorism
Some Central Asian media reports are sounding increasingly nervous about the possibility of domestic terrorist activity tied to the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.
In Tajikistan, days after police arrested 20 alleged Islamic militants who had reportedly come back from fighting in Syria with plans to blow up two road tunnels, one analyst “warned that the threat from IS to Tajikistan and to other Central Asian countries was very real,” Radio Free Europe reports.
“The situation shows that an underground infrastructure has developed in the Ferghana Valley that enables local extremists to collaborate with jihadists in Russia, the Middle East, and Africa,” Ikhom Kuliyev wrote on centralasia.ru, according to RFE.
Kuliyev said Central Asia lies in “an arc of instability.”
The same day Kuliyev’s analysis appeared, Tajikistan’s Asia-Plus news agency reported that 12 “terrorism-related” crimes had been reported in the country during the first nine months, up sharply from three during the same period last year – although Central Asia’s repressive rulers tend to define terrorism broadly.
In Kyrgyzstan, “intelligence services have warned that hundreds of nationals have joined extremist organizations,” RFE reports.
Vesti.kg, a Russian-language online magazine, quoted an “expert” who sees the sinister hand of the United States and NATO at work, waiting for the Islamic State to destabilize the region in order to intervene “at strategic sites in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.”
In a different media outlet, however, a local analyst said Kyrgyzstan is “less susceptible” to extremism, primarily because it lacks a border with Afghanistan, unlike Tajikistan. He said law enforcement agencies and analysts were working together against the threat.
Meanwhile, in addition to digging a ditch and installing additional barbed wire along its border with Afghanistan, Turkmenistan is sending tanks, artillery, and troops to trouble spots along the border, Central Asia Online reports.
Last month, villagers in northern Afghanistan said troops from Turkmenistan had started digging a trench, building a road, and erecting fences on Afghanistan’s territory. The moves were in response to reported incursions by the Taliban.
5. Fidesz proposes tax on Internet data transfers
The Hungarian opposition and communications trade groups came out today against a proposed tax on Internet data transfers, the Budapest Business Journal reports.
The opposition alliance E-PM said the tax levied on Internet service providers would be passed on to customers, thus making the Internet too expensive for many.
The proposal appeared in a draft 2015 tax bill submitted to parliament 21 October, Reuters reports. Internet providers would be taxed 150 forints ($0.62) per gigabyte of data traffic, although they would be able to recoup some of the extra tax by offsetting corporate income taxes.
Within hours more than 100,000 people joined a Facebook group against the levy and opponents of the tax announced a rally outside the Economy Ministry 26 October.
Economy Minister Mihaly Varga said the tax was expected to raise 20 billion forints ($83 million) annually. He defended the measure, saying the tax code needed to be changed to reflect changes in the way people use communications technology, Reuters writes.
Hungary already taxes telephone calls and text messages, The Wall Street Journal notes, quoting Varga as saying most phone calls are now made via the Internet rather than by land lines.
“The measure would be the latest in a series of extraordinary taxes the Fidesz party government has introduced since coming into power in 2010,” the paper writes.