Westendorp sacks mayor of Bosnian town

The international High Representative in Bosnia, Carl Westendorp, sacked the mayor of the southern town of Stolac on Thursday for impeding the return of Muslim refugees, the Croatian news agency HINA reported.

Westendorp used the special authority given him by the Bonn Peace Implementation Council to order the dismissal of Pero Raguz, the agency said, quoting the peace co-ordinator's spokeswoman, Aisling Byrne.

Westendorp said in a letter to Raguz that he had failed to "fulfil the requirements for the unimpeded return of Bosnian Muslim refugees and to establish a special municipal commission to encourage and promote this process".

Out of 100 Muslim families due to return to Stolac under a 1996 pilot project, 82 had returned, a UNHCR spokesperson was quoted by the agency as saying on Thursday.

The spokesperson said that the UNCHR backed the decision to sack the mayor.

The Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia-Hercegovina was notified of the decision and asked to nominate another mayor.

BBC Monitoring (http://www.monitor.bbc.co.uk), based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.