[Info-tech] French telecoms firm Alcatel signs controversial deal for Kosovo (fwd)

[Xhemil Meco]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 18 Dec 1999 13:30:19 PST
From: AFP <C-afp at clari.net>
Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.balkans, clari.tw.telecom.phone_service,
    clari.hot.a, biz.clarinet.sample
Followup-To: biz.clarinet.sample
Subject: French telecoms firm Alcatel signs controversial deal for Kosovo

  	  				 
   PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, Dec 18 (AFP) - The French telecoms firm  
Alcatel has signed a deal to supply Kosovo with a new mobile 
telephone network, officials said Saturday, despite staunch local 
opposition which led to the suspension of the head of Kosovo's 
telecommunications firm PTK. 
   The deal was signed in Paris on Friday by the economic director  
of the UN interim administration in Kosovo (UNMIK), Gerard Fischer, 
who last week took over as acting head of PTK following the 
suspension of the firm's ethnic Albanian director, Agron Dida. 
   Dida was suspended by UNMIK's French head Bernard Kouchner for  
"lack of cooperation" with the Joint Civil Commission (JCC), the 
body of international and local experts charged with examining 
tenders for the mobile network. 
   He said PTK had recommended the German telecommunications giant  
Siemens, which he said offered a much better financial package than 
Alcatel. He threatened to resign if the Alcatel contract was signed. 
   But Alcatel came with a partner firm, Monaco Telecom, which  
could handle Kosovo's international calls without passing via 
Belgrade, whose forces were bombed out of Kosovo by NATO in June to 
halt widespread oppression of ethnic Albanians. 
   Siemens had no international partner, which UNMIK sources said  
could have opened the door to demands for an international code for 
Kosovo, seen as a step toward independence. 
   Under UN resolution 1244, Kosovo was awarded substantial  
autonomy but denied the independence demanded by ethnic Albanians 
who make up the overwhelming majority of Kosovars. 
   Friday's deal allows PTK's subsidiary PTK-Vala 900 to purchase  
Alcatel equipment with an ultimate capacity for 100,000 lines, UNMIK 
said in a statement. 
   Kosovo's seven main towns are due to have a mobile network up  
and running within 12 weeks, the statement added. 
   It said the first phone calls could be made in January next  
year, while roaming agreements -- allowing callers to use other 
mobile systems in Kosovo -- would "produce substantial revenue for 
Kosovo," whose budget stems from international aid and customs 
duties.