Even though Yugoslavia no longer exists as a country, its property
still exists in New York. A $20 million 14-room duplex at 730 Park Avenue that has
six bedrooms, four bathrooms and two half- baths and used to be home to the
country’s U.N. envoys, could soon hit the market, the New York Post
reported. The apartment was vacated in 1992 soon after the country’s
dissolution, but since then, the five countries that grew out of
Yugsolavia have been laying competing claims to the property. The last occupant was Darko Silovic, the final UN ambassador to represent the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The apartment across the hall from where CBS newsman Mike Wallace lives.
After a
judge ruled in 1995 that the ownership was a political question and
not a legal one, Serbia agreed to pay the maintenance charges, now up
to $12,300 a month. But with the ownership dispute still ongoing, the
co-op refused to allow Serbian or other diplomats to live there. Now
an agreement to sell the apartment is expected to be signed in
Sarajevo, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, this week. Then the the five
countries will have to agree on a broker. Serbia will get 39.5 percent
of the proceeds, according to a formula based on the economic power of
each successor country, and could then try to recoup the $2 million in
maintenance it has paid for the empty apartment over 19 years. [Post]