BELGRADE (AFP) - Serbia’s Supreme Court yesterday rejected Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica’s petition against the invalidation of last week’s presidential polls, Tanjug news agency reported. Kostunica’s Demoratic Party of Serbia (DSS) filed the complaint after the electoral commission declared the December 8 vote invalid because turnout did not reach the required 50 percent minimum. Kostunica has repeatedly claimed the electoral lists are stacked with non-existent voters, effectively raising the minimum turnout requirement. A third election is expected to be called in the coming months in Serbia.

THE HAGUE (AFP) - Nobel peace laureate and Auschwitz survivor Elie Wiesel yesterday condemned Bosnian-Serb leader Biljana Plavsic (photo), for her silence over atrocities attributed to her. “How could she remain silent in the face of so much spilt blood?” the Romanian-born author told the UN war crimes tribunal through a videolink. For her part, Plavsic downplayed her own role in the campaign of ethnic cleansing. Instead, she pointed to Slobodan Milosevic and Bosnian-Serb leader Radovan Karadzic as the masterminds of the plan. Plavsic, 72, in October became the most senior official from the former Yugoslavia to plead guilty to crimes against humanity for her role in the campaign of ethnic cleansing of non-Serbs in the bloody 1992-95 Bosnian war. The three-day hearing that started yesterday is designed to help the judges in determining a sentence.

A leftist inmate starved to death, bringing to 62 the number of deaths in a hunger strike protesting Turkey’s prison system, a prisoners’ group said yesterday. Feride Harman, 27, died at her home on Sunday night after fasting for more than a year, the prisoners’ support group Ozgur Tayad said. (AP)

Activists from the environmental organization Greenpeace demonstrated in Ankara yesterday to press Italy to take back several barrels of toxic waste which washed up on the Turkish coast after being dumped in the Black Sea 15 years ago, the group said. “Italy, take back your toxic waste,” read a large banner in the colors of the Italian flag which was unfurled by the demonstrators in front of the Italian Embassy here. (AFP)

Seeking to continue its program of disarming civilians, the Albanian government proposed a draft law for the collection of weapons, officials announced yesterday. The draft — which still must be passed by Parliament — will be in effect for two years, during which the UN plans to disburse about $800,000 in development projects. Those handing over weapons will not be prosecuted, and their communities can apply for up to $50,000 to be invested in local projects. (AP)