Serbia Seeks Arrest of Opposition Members

After warning that it will crack down on opponents of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic’s regime, Serbia’s government moved late Tuesday to arrest two opposition figures and 11 striking miners.

The prosecutor’s office in Belgrade, the Yugoslav and Serbian capital, asked an investigative judge to order the detention of Boris Tadic, the Democratic Party’s deputy leader, and Nebojsa Covic, who heads the Democratic Alternative, according to a statement carried by the state-run Tanjug news service.

Both groups are part of the 18-party coalition backing Vojislav Kostunica, the opposition leader who says Milosevic fraudulently denied him victory in Sept. 24 elections. His supporters are trying to force Milosevic from power with street protests and strikes.

The prosecutor accused Tadic and Covic of sabotage for supporting a strike at Serbia’s Kolubara coal mines, which provide fuel for the republic’s power supply.

The prosecutor accused the 11 miners of striking “with intent to jeopardize the security of the federal republic of Yugoslavia and the defense system of the country.”

It wasn’t clear Tuesday night whether the investigative judge had agreed to the prosecutor’s request, or whether the opposition leaders and strikers had been arrested. But Kostunica’s supporters saw the statement as another sign that Milosevic is preparing a broader crackdown.

Earlier Tuesday, the government warned that it will move against what it called foreign-backed “criminal activities.”

“Legal measures will be taken against violent behavior of individuals and groups who are endangering the lives of citizens, disrupting normal traffic, preventing the work of companies and institutions, and the work of schools and health institutions,” said the statement read on state-run television.

The ominous announcement came as rotating blackouts hit several towns and cities, including Belgrade and Novi Sad. The government of Serbia, the larger of Yugoslavia’s two republics, blamed striking coal miners.

Kostunica’s followers plan to hold a 24-hour general strike today that they had promised earlier in the week, intent on forcing the Yugoslav president from power. Kostunica has declared himself president-elect and refuses to challenge Milosevic in a runoff election called for Sunday.

About 50,000 protesters marched toward Milosevic’s home in Belgrade’s Dedinje district Tuesday but were turned back by riot police.

Police also broke up protesters’ blockades that have stopped traffic on many roads and highways. At least 11 opposition supporters were arrested, including Dragoljub Stosic, the leader of the public transport trade union.

The Serbian government’s statement Tuesday accused “various foreign intelligence agencies” of “continuing to lead a special war against our country, trying to cause chaos, frighten citizens and prevent the normal functioning of institutions.”

The government took aim at Serbia’s independent media, which for months have been harassed and, in the case of the major broadcasters, largely silenced by police. The new, unspecified measures “apply to the media that are financed from abroad, which are spreading disorder among the citizens and spread lies and untruths, inciting bloodshed,” the statement said.

The government also signaled that it will try to break the most significant strike, at the massive Kolubara mines. About 7,500 miners have been off the job since Friday at four open-pit mines about 25 miles south of Belgrade. Their strike has become a symbol of the effort to drive Milosevic from power.

The strikers denied that they are at fault for the power shortages, insisting that the plant has at least two days’ worth of coal supplies. The miners accused the state-run power company of cutting electricity as a provocation against Kostunica’s supporters.

“They are trying to blame us, but they are to blame,” said Zoran Cvetanovic, a member of the miners’ strike committee. “Everybody knows that those who are guilty are in Dedinje,” referring to Milosevic’s neighborhood. Hours after he was interviewed, Cvetanovic’s name appeared on the list of miners whose arrest is being sought by the Belgrade prosecutor.

A menacing visit by the Yugoslav army’s commander in the early morning darkness Tuesday left several thousand striking miners worried that they will be the first target in any crackdown.

A few hundred of the exhausted strikers were shocked to see Gen. Nebojsa Pavkovic arrive at 1:10 a.m. with military police in armored vehicles and jeeps.

Pavkovic told the miners that “the state is in danger, that the army is in danger because Kolubara is not working,” Cvetanovic said.

“His role was to scare us with his authority and personality,” Cvetanovic said. “He claimed he didn’t know the reasons why we are on strike. We asked him to pass the message to the former president [Milosevic] to solve the situation justly and not to bring the state into danger. Pavkovic said that he will try.

“He then started to threaten,” the miner added. “He was threatening that the army is mighty and capable and that it will conquer machines if needed. We told Pavkovic that if he does that it will be his responsibility.”

Soon after the strike began, Milovan Zunjic, a top director of the mines and local boss of Milosevic’s ruling Socialist Party, said he would use Serbian refugees from Kosovo to work the coal pits, according to the strikers.

The local military headquarters in the nearby town of Lazarevac--a former Milosevic stronghold with about 30,000 residents--has begun issuing draft notices to miners to participate in “military exercises,” according to the town’s radio station.

And a rumor was spreading among the strikers that some had received government orders to return to work--vestiges of the state of emergency declared last year during the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s air war against Yugoslavia.

If the directives, officially called “working obligation orders,” have been issued, the recipients could be fired and jailed if they stay off the job, said Dragan Joksovic, one of three volunteer lawyers helping the miners.

The miners will refuse to work until Milosevic hands over power to Kostunica, Cvetanovic said after attending a meeting Tuesday of about 1,000 workers.

So far, there have been only minor clashes between police and demonstrators. In some cases, officers have been openly friendly with Kostunica supporters, suggesting that they are sympathetic to the cause.

But the police force, which has been a principal supporter of Milosevic’s regime, still appears to be following orders. The state-controlled Politika newspaper denied a Montenegrin newspaper report that the head of Serbian state security, Rade Markovic, had been fired. It called the report “a big lie.”