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Athens Conference (UPI)
By STEFAN RACIN
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia, April
21 (UPI) -- A senior official of the Greek foreign ministry has resigned
after arousing the government's displeasure for expressing support to Serb
opposition representatives at their meeting in Athens today with Serbian
crown prince Alexander Karadjordjevic, the Beta news agency reported.
The official, Aleksandros
Rondos, who is general director of the ministry's directorate for
international relations, told the two-day gathering that Foreign Minister
Jorgos Papandreou himself would address it on Saturday. Beta described
Rondos as a close aide to the minister.
If Mr. Papandreou does come
to speak, it would mark a serious rupture within the
Greek cabinet over policy toward Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic
and his regime. Sources close to the Greek government were cited by Beta
as indicating prior to the meeting that Athens had distanced itself from
the meeting.
Greece has been walking
a tightrope between the Belgrade regime and its opponents in Serbia
and Montenegro and has been at pains not to offend Mr. Milosevic.
But it has also had contacts
with Montenegro's president Milo Djukanovic and other top officials
who are at odds with Mr. Milosevic and his entourage.
Some 90 Serb opposition
and church leaders and representatives of the Serbian Diaspora mostly
from the United States are attending the meeting.
Three Serbian orthodox church
bishops Artemije, Amfilohije and Atanasije are present as are leaders
of most major opposition parties and representatives of the strong student
and youth "Resistance" movement, and some non-government organizations.
Vuk Draskovic, leader of
the biggest Serbian Renewal Movement, who is not in Athens, is represented
by a senior party official who carried a message to the prince asking him
to renounce his British passport and settle permanently in Belgrade.
The Athens meeting, titled
"Time for Change, Time for Democracy" was called by Prince Alexander,
who is the only son of Yugoslavia's last King Peter the Second and pretender
to the Yugoslav and Serbian throne.
The aim of the meeting,
the largest of several the opposition leaders have had with the prince
so far is to try and weld the fractious opposition into a single force
against Milosevic.
In his opening remarks, the
prince said the gathering was about the fate of the Serbian nation
and all citizens of Serbia. He appealed to his guests to set all their
disagreements aside and think of the difficult position the Serbs had found
themselves in. He told them they had come together to consider ways and
means of achieving radical changes in Serbia and saving the Serbian and
Yugoslav peoples from further destruction and misfortune.
In a statement, the participants
said they would discuss possibilities for "propelling the present
repressed society forward into the future in which democracy will reign
and human rights will be respected." |