The Three Bosnian "buts"

Sarajevo (the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina) is expected to stage its own Hague conference on the republic level, though nobody knows as yet when. The Serbian Assembly of this republic has officially invited the two other parties in power, the Party of Democratic Action and the Croatian Democratic Unionto join in the negotiations concerning the position of Bosnia and Herzegovina in what will be left of Yugoslavia. Surprising the masses, who are by now used to the treacherous behaviour of our politicians, those who were invited came, BUT...

That BUT is the biggest problem of Bosnia and Herzegovina, since it always comes when any kind of solution to the existing problem of the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina presents itself. The situation in Bosnia has assumed the worst posssible characteristics of the Yugoslav crisis. It seems that certain Bosnian intellectuals are right in saying that they do not have either the state or the republic, so they have been wondering what the three parties could agree on at all, considering the fact that they could not reach the agreement in the past year concerning certain basic issues.

When the three national parties have joined their forces and agreed on the division of power it seemed that their rule would be characterized by mutual trust and respect.

The Serbian side suggested the negotiations in order to avoid the war. The public announcement read as follows: "Considering that the Serbian people have at the BiH referendum dicided to stay in Yugoslvia, and that the parties which represent the interests of the Muoslims support the sovereign BiH and the change of its status with regards to the federal stzte, and the party representing the Croatian people does not wish the Croatians to stay in Yugoslavia, it is essential that the political negotiations be started so that the crisis could be solved with political means and the civil war avoided".

And here again we are faced with the famous Bosnian "but". Why suggest the negotiations at all when it is a known fact that no one will budge an inch from their original stand. This is being widely confirmed. The secretary of the Party of Democratic Action Osman Brka says for "Vreme": "We are in favour of talks but there are two non-negotiable issues and these are: first, that the Moslims are a nation nd that BiH is just as sovereign as Serbia and Croatia. An agreement, however, will have to be reached since in the opposite case we are damned - all of us. Take Vukovar, for example: there are no victors there, only the disgrace remains. That is a contemptuous act for the civilized world". He has also said that the Party of Democratic Action would consent to emergency elections in the interests of solving the problem, that is, it would consent to anything "that goes in the direction of democracy and that will be good for Bosnia and Herzegovina".