Key deal agreed in Montenegro

Dukanovic's coalition government received the red light for its independence plans when the Liberals hopped on board

PODGORICA, Yugoslavia -- A referendum on independence for Montenegro has moved closer after the minority government signed a deal with liberals to secure a joint coalition government.

President Milo Djukanovic signed a one-year deal with the Liberal Alliance party on Monday tying him to a possible referendum on secession from Yugoslavia by January 2002, the Associated Press reported.

The agreement gave the Liberals two crucial concessions, the agency said.

One is that the Montenegrin parliament will have to approve a new law on an independence referendum two to three months after inauguration, and to schedule that referendum within six months.

The other is to commit Djukanovic's camp to consult with the Liberals on any new legislation ahead of official parliamentary debate.

The Liberals, under their leader Miodrag Zivkovic, also managed to get the position of Montenegrin parliament speaker.

Djukanovic needed the agreement to form a minority government after poor showing in the April 22 elections which left the country divided between those in favour of a split and those against.

The president's coalition, "Victory Belongs to Montenegro," won 36 of the 77-member assembly, short of a simple majority needed to form a government which could carry on with independence plans.

His main pro-Yugoslav opponents secured 33 seats and the Liberals won six, with the remaining two going to ethnic Albanian parties.

Djukanovic had at one stage announced he would go it alone before Monday's change despite appeals against such a move by Serbia, its larger partner in Yugoslavia, and Western powers.

Montenegro and Serbia are the only republics that remain of the former larger Yugoslavia, a six-republic state which began to break up in the early 1990s.