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Date:         Thu, 7 Jan 1993 13:52:06 +1030
Reply-To:     Paul Hellander <phelland@ADAM.ADELAIDE.EDU.AU>
From:         Paul Hellander <phelland@ADAM.ADELAIDE.EDU.AU>
Subject:      GREEK TRUCKS TURNED BACK AT MACEDONIAN BORDER (fwd)
Comments: To: Hellenic Discussion group <hellas@brownvm.brown.edu>

Forwarded message:
From 100036.607@compuserve.com Wed Jan  6 15:38:03 1993
Date: 05 Jan 93 23:57:31 EST
From: Demetres Dounas <100036.607@CompuServe.COM>
To: Paul Hellander <phelland@adam.adelaide.edu.au>
Subject: GREEK TRUCKS TURNED BACK AT MACEDONIAN BORDER
Message-Id: <930106045731_100036.607_DHM50-5@CompuServe.COM>



--------------- Forwarded Story ---------------

Headline: GREEK TRUCKS TURNED BACK AT MACEDONIAN BORDER
Wire Service: RTec (Reuters Euro Community Report)
Date:   06 I 1993

    By Dina Kyriakidou
    ATHENS, Jan 5, Reuter - Customs officers from the former Yugoslav republic
of Macedonia have stopped Greek trucks from crossing into their territory, the
Greek foreign ministry said on Tuesday.
    It said several trucks were turned back on Monday and told they lacked the
proper transport documents. The ministry advised all Greek truckers to avoid
the frontier with the republic until the situation was clarified.
    The ministry noted that transit permits issued by the former state of
Yugoslavia, which broke apart last year, had expired on December 31, 1992.
    Macedonia, which has declared independence from the former Yugoslav state,
was honouring the old permits but now seemed to be adopting a new tactic in a
long-running dispute with Greece which is blocking international recognition
of Macedonia until it changes its name.
    The ministry noted the former Macedonian republic had issued no permits
for its territory and said the situation at the border -- Greece's main land
route to Europe -- was confused.
    "The inconsiderate behaviour of the (Macedonian) customs authorities,
especially at this hour, anything but contributes to the effort for a calm
climate in the area," foreign ministry spokesman Dimitris Avramopoulos said.
    "We point out such actions clearly do not damage Greece," he added. He
apparently meant Greece could use alternate routes via Bulgaria but the
fledgling republic had few options to sending its goods through Greece to the
port at Salonika.
    Before Yugoslavia began breaking apart, and Greece became embroiled in its
dispute with Macedonia, about 40 per cent of all Greek exports went overland
through Macedonia to central and western Europe.
    The Greek transport ministry said that following Monday's incidents truck
drivers had been advised to take other routes -- through Bulgaria, Serbia and
Hungary -- if problems appeared at the Greek-Macedonian border.
    It said trucks were already using these longer and more expensive routes
and no lines were forming at the border. It was unclear whether and when
Macedonia would provide transit permits for Greek trucks, it added.
    The latest confusion increased tensions along the border, which Macedonian
authorities have repeatedly claimed in recent months was being closed by the
Greeks.
    Greece blocked oil exports to Macedonia and other former Yugoslav
republics in August to dispel accusations that it was breaking U.N. sanctions
against Serbia and Montenegro.
    The United Nations imposed the sanctions in May to force the two
republics, the only ones left in the remnant Yugoslav state, to abandon
support for rebel Serbs in the neighbouring breakaway states.
    Greece eventually bowed to pressure and resumed oil supplies to Macedonia,
saying they were being sent to the poor republic of two million Slavs and
Albanians for humanitarian reasons.
    The foreign ministry on Tuesday denied press reports that Greece was
taking counter measures following Monday's incidents and turning back trucks
from Macedonia.
    "The information is inaccurate. No such decision has been made,"
Avramopoulos said.
    Macedonia is the only one of the four breakaway Yugoslav republics which
has failed to gain widespread international recognition.
    Greece says the name Macedonia signals a resurgence of long- standing
territorial ambitions against Greece's own northern Macedonia region.
    It is one of the Balkans more obscure disputes but is slowly creating the
sort of bitterness between Greeks and Slavs which led to several wars and
conflicts in the region this century.
 REUTER DRK THW

Copyright 1993 Reuters Information Services, Inc.  All rights reserved.


Distribution:
  Paul Hellander >Internet:phelland@adam.adelaide.edu.au.



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