BOSNIA: ASHDOWN DISMISSES SERB SPEAKER KALINIC, "NUMEROUS OTHERS"
SRNA - June 30, 2004

Banja Luka, 30 June: (Bosnian) Serb Republic People's Assembly Speaker Dragan Kalinic has confirmed that High Representative Paddy Ashdown has dismissed him from this post today.

Addressing the deputies, Kalinic assessed this "as the most brutal cleansing of the political scene in the Serb Republic, because apart from me, numerous others have been dismissed and more will be heard about it later".

Kalinic said that this was "Ashdown's draconian decision", stressing that "I shall use all available legal means to contest it".

According to him, from tomorrow he is banned from engaging in any political or public activity and from entering offices, and his salary has been stopped, as well as his pension and health insurance.

"It is paradoxical, but good, that no-one will hold me accountable for what will happen in the SDS (Serb Democratic Party) and the Serb Republic in the future," Kalinic said.

He added that he regretted nothing he had done over the past few years and that he was convinced that he did the best he could in the People's Assembly and the SDS.

Source: SRNA news agency, Bijeljina, in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian 0945 gmt 30 Jun 04

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