A Massage From Pale

Thanks to our colleagues from the independent radio station B-92, VREME obtained a copy of speeches given at the session of the Bosnian Serb Parliament in Pale. The Parliament discussed the letters of the Serbian leadership and the former allies' request that the peace plan of the Contact Group is accepted.

Milanovic: ``I must admit that I felt humiliated and insulted when I heard about and read this letter. If I had died yesterday by any chance I wouldn't be able to believe that such an ultimative letter could be written to a Serb by a Serb. If one were to close his eyes he wouldn't be able to recognize a Serb in it. I specifically mean the Serbian Prime Minister. We, the Serbs in the Bosnian Serb Republic, as a part of one Serbian people, have never either with words or acts showed that we dismissed the fact that there is only one elected head of state of the Serbian people. We have been aware of that all along. We have wanted him to be our president as well, but we remind Mr. Marjanovic (the Serbian Prime Minister) that we have been legitimately elected as representatives of the people in the multi-party elections of this republic of former Bosnia-Herzegovina. We are answerable to this people and do not wish to ignore that responsibility. On the contrary. (...) I am absolutely aware of the responsibility we have and we have made a decision. If we sign this, than we will have signed our own sentence. The people told me that if I raise my hand to support the signature that hand will be only mine, and not theirs as well. If I raise my hand to oppose the signature, then I will have raised my hand together with theirs...''

Brdjanin: ``I have a feeling that the letters, especially the one written by the Government, are full of regrets since the Muslims and the Croats have not been given more. We must tell the people that we do not have the right to give up Srborbran (former Gornji Vakuf), Jajce... Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev is giving us guarantees, but isn't capable of guaranteeing anything even to himself, he is on his knees in front of America.

We want with our hearts and our souls the Republic of Serb Krajina to remain with us. Why is its leadership still quiet? Those playing the roles of puppets at crucial moments must be immediately recognized and removed, or the darkness will engulf us.

Do the gentlemen who composed this letter know that there are two million people here, two million of those Serbs who comprise the nucleus and the defense of Orthodoxy. I have already told you that I'd rather have a devil as an ally, than communists.

The second letter is full of insults and even hatred. I want to tell Marjanovic who believes that this should be signed, and who is from these areas by origin, to come here and then we will have him sign it. It is much easier and simpler to say it when one is on Terazije Square (which is in the center of Belgrade).

A word doesn't mean anything in diplomacy. How can Kozyrev guarantee us anything?

We have to tell the people what they'll get if we accept this: they would have to listen awful music, look at the Arabic script in their primers, etc. And that there is no Bosnian Serb Republic according to the Contact Group. They want to take away twenty per cent of the territory of the Bosnian Serb Republic, and not 0.5, 1, or 2 per cent. The truth is that there is no Bosnian Serb Republic according to the Contact Group. We would be left without vital objects: TV relays, the industry, railway tracks... We would live in ghettoes.

Those who think that the sanctions were imposed because of us are wrong. But, even if it were so, I certainly hope that we were not cursed to put some two million people in a ghetto only because of the sanctions and comfier. Gentlemen, I know that the sanctions have to be lifted but not on our expense. No one has the right to forget those who died, this isn't demagogy, this is the truth.

Those who give us advice, and especially those who come from this area, should take 1914 as an example and send their sons here to defend their native land rather than stay in Belgrade acting as great leaders and administer advice from Belgrade.

Gentlemen, even if we were all to kill ourselves the sanctions would not be lifted. I am convinced that the people agrees with this. Let me conclude: the Contact Group will stop putting pressure when twelve million Serbs rise and say what our borders are. Who gave them the right to create Yugoslavia without us, and now all of a sudden they won't allow us to decide about our destiny. Croatian President Franjo Tudjman sent his troops to defend the Croats then it is our duty to defend Kosovo (the southern Serbian province) when it rises one day but they also have a duty to defend the Bosnian Serb Republic. I propose that we do not throw the hot potato into the hands of the people. We should say a resolute ``no'', and the people will either accept or reject it.

No one can accept this. This is a blackmail, this is a signature of the capitulation of the lowest kind. We had better moved the people to Serbia before everything, although I am not sure who would have welcomed us there. We would perhaps be welcomed by some Alija or Ante (typically the Muslim and the Croat name) who are still in their ranks. We could as well teach them what the Serb cause is all about. Especially the capital city Belgrade where, unfortunately, twenty percent of the people give their votes to Vuk Draskovic (the leader of the Serbian Renewal Movement).''

Nedic: ``I spent last night on Mount Ozren. We watched TV when those two letters we heard here we read on television. My neighbors asked me to tell Radovan Karadzic to personally examine those who wrote the letters, only this time not as a president but as a psychiatrist.''