ANKARA (AP) - In a new push for EU membership, Turkey’s ruling party yesterday proposed a series of constitutional reforms, including abolishing controversial security tribunals. The package submitted to Parliament yesterday would scrap State Security Courts — tribunals that are a legacy of a military coup here in 1980. It would also remove references to the death penalty, which Turkey recently abolished; insert a clause asserting the equality of the sexes; remove military members from boards that oversee television and radio broadcasts and make appointments to universities; open up military finances to greater scrutiny; and assert the supremacy of international laws over domestic ones in contentious cases.

BELGRADE (AP) - About one-third of Serbia’s children are threatened with poverty, lacking the basic conditions for normal development and a happy childhood, a UN report obtained yesterday said. The research, conducted by UNICEF, also said that more than half of the republic’s sick children don’t get medical aid while some 10 percent don’t go to school. “Children are often hardest hit by poverty,” said UNICEF Area Representative Ann-Lis Svensson. “Poverty causes lifelong damage to their minds and bodies.” The survey, called “The Many Faces of Poverty,” was carried out in eight municipalities in Serbia, including those with large refugee communities and ethnically mixed areas, over a six-month period in 2003, said UNICEF Communication Officer Jadranka Milanovic.

The Netherlands will ratify an EU stabilization and association agreement (SAA) with Croatia, a first step to joining the bloc, as Zagreb improved cooperation with the UN war crimes court, the Foreign Ministry said. (AFP)

Croatia’s Constitutional Court yesterday lifted a ban on Sunday shopping, ruling that the ban conflicts with a free-market economy and equality. Croatia in October ordered shopping malls and larger stores closed on Sundays, following strong pressure from the Roman Catholic Church. (AP)

Bulgaria late on Tuesday thanked the EU for asking Libyan leader Muammar Khadafy to release six Bulgarians on trial in Libya for allegedly spreading the virus that causes AIDS. European Commission President Romano Prodi “clearly submitted the Bulgarian case to the Libyan leader,” Bulgarian Foreign Minister Solomon Passy told the media. (AFP)