TUDJMAN THROWS A CURVE

With the Balkan peace talks at a critical stage, Croatian president Franjo Tudjman took on the international war crimes tribunal by promoting a man that the U.N. court had just indicted. Tihomir Blaskic, a commander of Bosnian Croat troops, was charged with "crimes against humanity," according to Tuesday's indictment, for taking part in an ethnic cleansing operation that "effectively destroyed or removed almost the entire Muslim civilian population in the Lasva Valley" in 1993. Tudjman's promotion of Blaskic complicates the peace process because the Clinton Administration has indicated its desire to ensure that war criminals are not given immunity at the negotiating table. It should also give chief tribunal prosecutor Richard Gladstone even more items for his agenda as he arrives in Washington Thursay for talks with the Clinton Administration.