ACCESSION NUMBER:243779 FILE ID:POL104 DATE:09/21/92 TITLE:STATE DEPARTMENT REPORT, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21 (09/21/92) TEXT:*92092104.POL STATE DEPARTMENT REPORT, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21 (Bosnia, Somalia, Mideast talks, India/Syria, Sudan) (640) There was no regular State Department briefing, but Joseph Snyder, a department press spokesman, talked to reporters about the following subjects: SHELLING OF SARAJEVO CONTINUES Snyder said that Bosnian Serbs "have continued their destructive and 1njustified shelling of Sarajevo and other cities" in Bosnia-Hercegovina. The shelling of Sarajevo continues from U.N. monitored sites and undeclared artillery sites, he noted. The parties in Bosnia had agreed to concentrate their heavy weapons for monitoring by U.N. forces, but Snyder said it is clear the Bosnian Serbs have not done so. U.S. FLIGHTS OF SOMALI AID CONTINUE Snyder said U.S. airplanes continue to carry humanitarian aid from the Kenyan port of Mombasa to Somalia and to refugee camps in northern Kenya. This past weekend, he reported, there were 16 relief flights, delivering 275 metric tons of aid. Since July 3, he said, U.S. military planes have flown 278 relief missions in Somalia and Kenya delivering some 3,500 metric tons of humanitarian assistance. Two U.S. planes carrying part of a 500-man Pakistani security force arrived in Mogadishu September 21, he said. A third flight was also due that day. The Pakistani soldiers will guard relief shipments entering the Somali port. DISCUSSIONS BEGIN ON DATE FOR NEXT MIDEAST TALKS ROUND Snyder said parties at the current round of bilateral Middle East peace talks in Washington have suggested the talks break off September 24. "We are consulting with the parties about the date for the next round," he said. NO COMMENTS ON REPORTED INDIAN CHEMICAL SALES TO SYRIA Snyder said the State Department would not comment on a New York Times report that the United States has protested to India over Indian sales to Middle East nations of chemicals needed to make poison gas. The September 21 article says U.S. intelligence discovered the shipment from India to Syria of a chemical that could be used for pesticides as well as an ingredient for nerve gas. The Times says American officials concluded that the shipment was intended for Syria's chemical weapons program. Later, a State Department official described the Times story as "pretty accurate." Snyder said the United States "strongly supports the chemical weapons convention and its goal of banning chemical weapons completely." When the convention comes into force, he noted, "it will ultimately ban the production, acquisition, stockpiling and the use of chemical weapons, and it will restrict and ultimately prohibit the sale of chemical weapon precursors." The United States will continue to cooperate with the Australian Group, formed to deal with exports of chemical weapon precursors, and "other like-minded countries to deal with problems that come along," he added. U.S. CONCERNED ABOUT REPORTED SUDANESE EXECUTION The United States believes that Andrew Tombe, a senior Sudanese AID (U.S. Agency for International Development) employee in the southern Sudan town of Juba, has been executed after being convicted of treason by a military tribunal, Snyder said. "We have conveyed to the Sudanese ambassador our grave concerns about this incident," he said. "Given the continuing allegations of human rights abuses in the Sudan, particularly in Juba, and the government's delay in responding to our repeated requests for information about Tombe, we are viewing this incident with the gravest concern," he emphasized. The United States is "strongly reiterating its request to the Sudanese 1overnment for permission for American staff to visit Juba and to investigate the events leading to Tombe's execution and to check on other Sudanese staff at our facility there," Snyder added. He said that Tombe was working for AID on its relief efforts for Sudan. "That was his job...and this required travel in the country," Snyder said. NNNN .