Ballots and bullets

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Mile-End's independent city councillor Helen Fotopulos is best known for her relentless opposition to the transformation of the Rialto theatre into a nightclub. But the multilingual politician just got back from a different type of gig: helping to monitor the June 11 by-elections in the Yugoslavian republic of Montenegro.

"They went very well. Everything was done very professionally," says Fotopulos. "And Montenegro is the most beautiful place--and no McDonald's! But it's the kind of place where anything can happen at any time. One moment I was driving up a beautiful mountain road with the friendliest people around. And then we turned the corner and there's 100 heavily armed soldiers wearing balaclavas standing by the side of the road."

There were two political shootings in the tiny Mediterranean republic (the junior partner to Serbia in what is left of Yugoslavia) around the time of her visit. Goran Zugic--a security advisor to Montenegrin president Milo Djukanovic--was killed by unknown gunmen a week prior to Fotopulos' trip. And the leader of the Yugoslav opposition, Vuk Draskovic, was wounded in Montenegro in an assassination attempt on June 14--the same day Fotopulos returned to Canada.

Although the republic is stable compared to Kosovo, Montenegro is filled with latent political and social tensions.

"The dominant impression from my trip was how little we understand the psychology of the Balkans--the underlying currents," Fotopulos says.

--John Edmonds

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