YUGOSLAVIA SEEKS TWO BILLION DLR REFINANCING
Deputy Prime Minister Janez Zemljaric,
speaking before a meeting with the Paris Club of creditor
nations, said Yugoslavia was seeking to refinance two billion
dlrs of debt.
    The official Tanjug news agency quoted Zemljaric as saying
Yugoslavia expected a "definite measure of understanding" from 16
western creditor countries when they meet on March 30.
    Zemljaric was not quoted as saying whether the two billion
dlrs referred to principal or interest or both. Yugoslavia's
hard currency debt stands between 19 and 20 billion dlrs.
    Zemljaric said the International Monetary Fund criticised
Yugoslavia for not regulating consumption, not having real
interest rates or market exchange rates, for its inability to
control monetary policy and slow pace of reform.
    He said the criticisms were in a report by an IMF
commission which visited Yugoslavia last December and January.
    "We cannot accept this assessment because we have made not
inconsiderable progress under difficult conditions, even though
we are aware of our own weaknesses," Zemljaric said.
    He said the report favourably assessed some trends in the
Yugoslav economy but did not say which.
    Milos Milosavljevic, also a Deputy Prime Minister, said
last Friday that Yugoslavia had repaid 640 mln dlrs of
principal and 325 mln dlrs of interest so far in 1987.
    According to official Yugoslav figures, Yugoslavia repaid a
record 5.97 billion dlrs in capital and interest in 1986.
    In an interview with the West German weekly magazine Der
Spiegel, Prime Minister Branko Mikulic said last weekend
Yugoslavia had repaid 28.3 billion dlrs in principal and
interest between 1981 and 1986.
 REUTER
