wfn.org | Adventists At Risk in Yugoslavia

["Christian B. Schäffler" <APD_Info_Schweiz@compuserve.com>]

May 1, 1999
Adventist Press Service (APD)
Christian B. Schäffler, Editor-in-chief
Fax +41-61-261 61 18
APD@stanet.ch
http://www.stanet.ch/APD
CH-4003 Basel, Schweiz

Adventists At Risk in Yugoslavia

Belgrade, Yugoslavia (APD)  Evening national 
newspaper, "Vecernje Novosti", in Belgrade, 
Yugoslavia, published an article on April 18, 
1999, which stated that General Wesley Clark, NATO 
supreme commander of the air strikes against 
Yugoslavia, "was and perhaps still is" a member of
the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

The writer of the article, M Bosnjak, quotes two 
sources to establish General Clark's affiliation to 
the Adventist Church.  The first is from an 
interview with Dr Dwight Nelson, Adventist pastor 
and theologian from U.S. based Andrews University, 
in May 1996 during an evangelistic series in 
Belgrade.  The second is an Italian newspaper, "Il 
Setimanale" which quoted some well-known 
theologians who mentioned Clark as belonging to the 
Seventh-day Adventist Church.

"General Clark is not nor has he ever been a member 
of the Seventh-day Adventist Church," writes 
Miodrag Zivanovic, communication director and 
spokesperson for the Church in Yugoslavia in his 
faxed response to the newspaper's editor. "We are 
loyal citizens of our country and believers in 
Jesus Christ, pursuing Biblical values - to love 
everybody and to live in peace.  Therefore, no one 
can be an aggressor and an Adventist Christian at 
the same time," he writes.  "We are already victims 
of this war.  Why do we have to be victims of lies 
in our country from our own people?"

Dr Dwight Nelson, in his response to the editor of 
the paper, writes: "I wish to categorically deny 
ever having made such a statement.  I  regret that 
in the course of the May 1996 interview with your 
reporter something was apparently either 
mistranslated or misunderstood. As a pastor and 
theologian I am deeply saddened for the suffering 
of the people in the Federal Republic of 
Yugoslavia, and I am praying that peace may return 
without delay."

As a result of the Church's reaction to the 
article, "Vecernje Novosti" published an 
article on April 19 entitled "Adventist Church 
Denies Clark as Member" rejecting General Clark's 
affiliation with the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

"With such false information in the newspaper 
during this time of war, Adventists are at great 
risk of being targets of hostility and physical 
assaults in their neighbourhoods," says Radisa 
Antic, president of the Seventh-day Adventist 
Church in Yugoslavia.  "We are afraid that our 
church buildings will be attacked by the local 
people as a result of this article."