Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, December 1998, pages 121-122

Facts for Your Files

September 1998 Chronology of U.S.-Middle East Relations

Compiled by Janet McMahon

Sept. 1: As new fighting broke out in Kosovo, Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic proposed a “degree of self-rule” for the province, 90 percent of whose residents are ethnic Albanians.

• Some 70,000 Iranian troops began maneuvers near Iran’s border with Afghanistan.

Sept. 2: The day after meeting with Yugoslav President Milosevic, U.S. envoy Christopher Hill met with ethnic Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova, who agreed to postpone discussion of Kosovo’s long-term legal status in any negotiations with Serbia.

Sept. 3: As chief U.N. arms inspector Richard Butler told the Security Council Baghdad was now interfering with routine inspections, former arms inspector W. Scott Ritter appeared before a joint Senate Foreign Affairs and Armed Services committee a week after his resignation and charged the Clinton administration with having thwarted weapons inspections in Iraq.

• Mohammed Saddiq Odeh, one of two suspects in the Aug. 7 bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, said he had been bullied into confessing by Pakistani investigators prior to being sent to the U.S. for trial.

• A Taliban militia spokesman said at least 10 Iranian diplomats missing in northwestern Afghanistan since Aug. 8 may be dead.

Sept. 5: As Tanzanian authorities arrested two suspects in the bombing of the American Embassy in Dar es-Salaam and the FBI issued an arrest warrant for a third suspect in the Nairobi bombing, The New York Times reported that the U.S. had developed plans the past spring for a covert raid against Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, to whom all of the suspects were linked.

• The presidents of Niger, Chad, Mali and Sudan defied the U.N. ban on air travel to Libya to attend a celebration of Muammer Qaddafi’s 29th year in power.

Sept. 6: An Israeli judge ruled that 18-year-old Maryland murder suspect Samuel Sheinbein can be extradited to stand trial despite having Israeli citizenship because he has not maintained “an attachment” to the Jewish state. Sheinbein’s attorney said his appeal could take months.

• The English-language Tehran Times reported that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s spiritual leader, had ruled out any military confrontation with Afghanistan.

Sept. 7: Following a two-day visit to Kosovo, Assistant Secretary of State John Shattuck and former Sen. Robert Dole, saying they had witnessed “a human catastrophe in the making,” met with Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.

• Iran ended its recent military maneuvers but announced that 70,000 troops would remain on its eastern border with Afghanistan.

Sept. 8: A new Serbian offensive against ethnic Albanians was reported underway in western Kosovo.

• Libyan leader Qaddafi said that he would allow the two suspects in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 to stand trial in The Hague only if there were guarantees “that the Netherlands is the last stop in case of acquittal or conviction.”

Sept. 9: The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously not to review sanctions on Iraq until Baghdad resumes cooperation with U.N. weapons inspectors.

• Some 25,000 civilians were reported to be fleeing their homes in southwestern Kosovo, jamming roads with tractors, wagons and cars.

• The U.S. Embassy in Lebanon warned all Americans there to be on alert because of a threatened attack on the embassy.

• U.S. envoy Dennis Ross arrived in Israel for another attempt to restart the peace process.

Sept. 10: Following its assassination of Hamas militants and brothers Adel and Imad Awadallah, Israel imposed a total closure on the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

• Mullah Mohammed Omar, leader of Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban, said 9 of 11 Iranians missing near Mazar-i-Sharif, whose bodies were discovered in the mountains, had been killed by “unidentified soldiers.”

• A Pakistani court for the first time sentenced a Muslim, Shi’i Ghulam Akbar Khan, to death for blasphemy.

Sept. 11: As Tehran vowed revenge, Afghanistan’s Taliban announced it would punish the killers of nine Iranian diplomats.

• Algerian President Liamine Zeroual announced he would shorten his term and call an early election before March.

Sept. 12: In the West Bank towns of Hebron and Al Birah, Israeli troops shot and wounded at least 30 Palestinians protesting the killing of Imad and Adel Awadallah.

• Serbian police ordered thousands of ethnic Albanian refugees in western Kosovo to return to their villages, many of which had been razed.

• The Sunni Muslim Taliban militia shelled an Iranian-backed Shi’i faction defending Bamiyan, the last Afghan city not under Taliban control.

• Azem Hajdari, a senior leader of Albania’s opposition Democratic Party, was shot dead as he left the party office in the capital of Tirana.

Sept. 13: Bosnia completed its national legislative two-day elections, which international observers described as peaceful and open.

• The Taliban announced it had captured Bamiyan in central Afghanistan, the capital of the country’s Shi’i Muslim minority.

• Israel refused to release the bodies of slain Hamas militants Imad and Adel Awadallah for burial, saying their funeral “would be a generator of violence.”

• Some 40 Algerians were killed in the 72 hours following President Zeroual’s announcement of early elections.

• One protester was killed and four guards of the Albanian prime minister wounded as demonstrators protesting the killing of opposition leader Azem Hajdari set fire to the main government building in Tirana, forcing the prime minister and his cabinet to flee in a hail of gunfire.

Sept. 14: Iraq’s parliament threatened to stop all cooperation with U.N. weapons inspections unless the Security Council reverses its decision to suspend regular review of sanctions on Iraq.

• The Albanian government announced it had crushed an attempted coup and was back in control of the capital after a day of intense fighting following the funeral of Azem Hajdari.

Sept. 15: As Israel lifted the closure on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu insisted that the Palestinian Authority be relentless in its campaign against Islamic militants before Israel would return more of the land it illegally occupies.

• As Taliban leaders asked the U.N. to establish a mediating process with Tehran, Afghan refugees from the northern city of Mazar e-Sharif said victorious Taliban troops engaged in a “killing frenzy” after capturing the city, where at least nine Iranian diplomats were among those killed..

Sept. 16: A U.N. observer team which visited Algeria during the summer, but which was not allowed to meet with the outlawed Islamic Salvation Front and other opposition leaders, issued a report blaming terrorists for most of the country’s violence and saying that the government, while guilty of “excesses,” deserved the world’s sympathy.

Sept. 17: Tensions increased in the West Bank following the killing of a Palestinian youth by a Jewish settler and Israel’s announcement that it planned to confiscate more Palestinian land to build additional housing for Jews only.

• Federal officials investigating the bombing of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania offered a $2 million reward for information leading to the arrest of Haroun Fazil, a native of Comoros, and arrested American citizen Wadih el Hage of Arlington, TX, who formerly worked as Osama bin Laden’s personal secretary, on charges of making false statements to investigators.

• The State Department announced it had brokered an agreement between the rival Kurdish Democratic Party, headed by Massoud Barzani, and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, led by Jalal Talibani, uniting them against Iraqi President Saddam Hussain.

• Swiss and French tests on Iraqi missile warheads found no evidence of the deadly nerve agent VX, findings which contradicted American results.

• Tehran closed the leading daily newspaper Tous and arrested its top editors for publishing articles detrimental to Iran’s “national interests and security.”

Sept. 18: Bosnian election results indicated the defeat of moderate pro-Western Bosnian Serb President Biljana Plavsic in favor of ultranationalist Nikola Poplasen, dealing a blow to Western hopes of a rebuilt multiethnic country.

• German police arrested and the U.S. filed charges against Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, a top lieutenant to Osama bin Laden.

• The Albanian parliament stripped former President Sali Berisha of immunity from prosecution for his alleged coup attempt.

Sept. 19: In a goodwill gesture to Tehran, Afghan’s Taliban militia released five Iranian “military” drivers captured in Mazar-i-Sharif.

• On the eve of the Jewish New Year, Israel closed the borders of the Gaza Strip and West Bank, where thousands of Palestinians marched in support of Hamas.

Sept. 20: As thousands of protesters marched in Khartoum to mark the one-month anniversary of the American missile attack on the Sudanese capital, National Security Adviser Samuel (Sandy) Berger rejected former President Jimmy Carter’s call for an inquiry into the attack on a chemical plant.

• Some 180 people were killed or wounded during an anti-Taliban missile attack on Kabul.

• Ethnic Albanian leaders released a peace proposal for Kosovo, giving the province its own legislature and equality with the two Yugoslav republics of Serbia and Montenegro.

Sept. 21: U.S. and Iranian officials met with the other members of the “six plus two” group of nations on Afghanistan—Russia, China, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan—during the opening of the U.N. General Assembly in New York.

Sept. 22: Iranian President Mohammad Khatami described as “completely finished” his country’s fatwa calling for the death of Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie.

• Kosovo ethnic Albanian leader Ahmet Krasniqi was shot and killed in Albania, the second such killing in 10 days.

• Citing “national interests,” Saudi Arabia expelled the Afghan chargé d’affaires and recalled its representative from Kabul.

Sept. 23: The U.N Security Council passed a resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire in Kosovo, as a new Serb offensive entered its second day.

• Turkey’s highest court upheld the 10-month jail sentence of Istanbul’s popular Islamist Mayor Tayyip Erdogan on charges of “inciting religious hatred,” for reading a turn-of-the-century nationalist poem that used religious imagery.

• Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said his country would sign a nuclear test-ban treaty within a year if sanctions imposed on Pakistan and India after their recent nuclear tests were lifted.

Sept. 24: The White House announced that President Clinton would meet the following week with Israeli Prime Minister Netanayahu and Palestinian President Arafat, both of whom would be in the U.S. for the opening of the U.N. General Assembly.

• Speaking before the General Assembly, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu warned against the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state, which President Arafat has threatened to announce in May 1999 when Oslo-mandated final status talks are scheduled to have been concluded.

• Britain restored diplomatic ties with Iran following Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi’s formal disavowal of the death threat against British author Salman Rushdie.

Sept. 25: Official Bosnian election results confirmed the victories of ultranational Nikola Poplasen as president of the Republika Srpska, but whose party failed to gain a majority in the Bosnian Serb legislature; and, to the tripartite Bosnian presidency, nationalist Croat Democratic Union leader Ante Jelavic to the Croat seat, Zivko Radisic, head of the Bosnian Serb party controlled by Yugoslav President Milosevic to the Serb seat, and the re-election of President Alija Izetbegovic to the Muslim seat.

• Sabri Hamiti, a close aide to moderate ethnic Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova, was shot and wounded in front of his home in a suburb of Pristina, the Kosovo capital.

Sept. 26: NATO allies Italy, Greece and Turkey joined the southeastern European countries of Albania, Bulgaria, Macedonia and Romania in creating a regional multinational military force for peacekeeping or aid operations in the Balkans and elsewhere.

Sept. 27: Secretary of State Madeleine Albright met in New York with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Palestinian President Arafat prior to their upcoming meeting with President Clinton.

• Israeli police fired tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets at Israeli Palestinians peacefully demonstrating in the northern town of Umm al-Fahm against Israeli army plans to confiscate acres of their olive groves to turn into a weapons-testing range.

• Margalit Har-Shefi, friend of Yitzhak Rabin assassin Yigal Amir, was sentenced to nine months in prison for knowing about but failing to prevent the murder of the late Israeli prime minister.

Sept. 28: After a 90-minute White House meeting, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Palestinian President Arafat agreed to participate in a full-scale summit in October. Later, Palestinian President Arafat’s plea to the U.N. General Assembly for its support of Palestinian statehood received a sustained ovation. Arafat then returned to the White House for further talks with President Clinton.

• As The Washington Post reported that Israel had supplied U.N. weapons inspectors in Iraq with detailed and sensitive intelligence, Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz opened talks with U.N. Secretary-General Annan aimed at resolving the latest impasse over the inspections.

• Hoping to avoid a threatened NATO attack, Serbia promised to withdraw its special police units from Kosovo.

Sept. 29: Palestinian President Arafat accepted a U.S. proposal for Israel to turn over 13 percent of the West Bank.

• Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah ibn Abdulaziz unexpectedly asked senior executives of seven U.S. oil companies to submit “recommendations and suggestions” for their possible role in the development of oil and gas fields in the Kingdom. Saudi Arabia had driven the companies out nearly two decades ago when it began nationalizing its petroleum industry.

• Algeria’s ruling National Democratic Rally urged President Zeroual not to resign.

• Albanian President Rexhep Mejdani asked Socialist Party secretary-general Pandeli Majko to form a new government.

Sept. 30: A Palestinian hurling grenades at an Israel patrol near a Jewish settlement in Hebron wounded 13 soldiers and 11 Palestinian passersby.

• Iran opened a new round of large-scale military exercises near its border with Afghanistan.