On the War Path

The doctrine of Klaus Kinkel, the German Minister for Foreign Affairs, has a tendency to expand: last week it went "let Srebrenica go, hold on to Zepa"; now it is "let Srebrenica and Zepa go, watch Gorazde"; further alterations are expected. At the time when this article is written (Thursday evening, July 20), Zepa, according to UN reports, is surrounded and deserted.

According to a legend, Germans never entered Zepa during World War II. There was no need to take it since the road to this small eastern Bosnian town is a cul de sac: it leads nowhere. The town would have probably remained unheard of, had Ivo Andric not written a book about it. When in the summer of 1992, Mladic's soldiers tried to seize Zepa, Bosnian forces ambushed them in a narrow canyon and defeated them causing serious damage and casualties. Zepa remained under siege, while refugees - victims of ethnic cleansing elsewhere in Eastern Bosnia - streamed into the town. Its estimated population rose to 17,000. After the fall of Srebrenica 7-8,000 refugees more arrived in Zepa. The exact number of Bosnian Army soldiers in the town is unknown, but UNPROFOR estimates that the number is considerably lower than in Srebrenica. The Zepa "safe area", in terms of the Security Council resolution, is protected by: 79 Ukrainian soldiers, threats of air strikes, and UN's moral authority. When it became clear that UN's moral authority is non-existent and that there will be no air strikes, Bosnian soldiers disarmed the Ukrainian troops stationed in Zepa, in order to get at least something out of the UN. Attempts at blackmail were also made: at one point, earlier last week, Muslims captured an Ukrainian captain and threatened to shoot him unless NATO bombs Serbian forces around Zepa; Serbs then captured their own share of the Ukrainians and threatened to kill them if they spot a NATO jet in the sky. Both sides soon abandoned their threats, realizing how absurd the whole affair was, and Radovan Karadzic, via General Rupert Smith, promised the Ukrainian government that its soldiers will be protected. The Ukrainians managed to incapacitate two of their armored vehicles to insure that neither warring party gets it. Bosnian government claims that at one moment the Ukrainians requested NATO air support, but the Dutch General Nicholai refused to grant it; UNPROFOR is denying this claim.

No matter what actually happened, Zepa is about to fall. Considering its non- existent strategic, economic or communicational importance, the question which imposes itself is- why? Because there are a few Muslims left in the town. General Mladic offered 50 coaches for the evacuation of Zepa; UN agreed with the idea; at first, Bosnian authorities refused to take part, but later an official admitted that "it is better to take part in ethnic cleansing than to allow ethnic killing". The remaining question however, is who will be allowed to leave Zepa and how.

As we know, Srebrenica was defended by the authority of the UN, backed by a Dutch UNPROFOR battalion. When Srebrenica fell, on Wednesday, July 12, ten thousand refugees, of which 3,500 were Bosnian Army soldiers, fled the area and made their way towards Tuzla. The 100 kilometer long journey took six days. Traveling mostly during the night, the refugees carried their children and the wounded in their arms, dragging the old and exhausted along with them, sometimes even having to fight their way through. On the following Tuesday only 4,000 of them reached Medjedje, south of Tuzla. The story they told was horrific; an English reporter described them as "an army of scarecrows emerging from the forest, hysterical, scruffy, with feet wrapped in cloth in a terrible psychological and physical state". UN high commissioner for refugees, Sadako Ogata, says that 19,000 people from the Srebrenica "safe area" are missing; a figure based on an unreliable UNHCR estimate made in 1993 according to which Srebrenica had a population of around of 42,000 inhabitants. This stream of 10,000 people left through the forest sending reconnaissance patrols in front because of minefields and ambushes. They crossed two rivers (Glogovska Reka and Jadar) on foot and climbed over many mountains; during the night they listened to calls to surrender broadcast over a megaphone. Near Kravice, a village west of Nova Kasaba on the road from Zvornik to Pale, they were ambushed. The line of refugees was split in half, there were many casualties; the wounded were not even counted: those who found themselves in the front half of the convoy survived. Some killed themselves with a bullet or a bomb after hearing the story told by a soldier who survived the slaughter of around 70 people near Konjevic Polje and joined the refugees before they were ambushed. It is not yet clear how many refugees died in the small arms fire, or from tank and mortar shelling; however it is known that only 300 civilians from Cerska, out of an initial group of 700, reached the territory under Bosnian Government control. Bosnian forces south of Tuzla, in the Medjedja- Baljkovica-Nezuk zone was expecting the convoy and made an advance to the south in order to reach it sooner (it appears that there was a radio link between the two). After reaching the front line south of Medjedja, the refugees asked the Serbian side to let them through; they were told to wait, which they decided not to do since they were already totally exhausted. They attacked and after 12 hours of battle reached the Bosnian side of the front line. They said that the rest of the convoy of another 3,000 refugees at the most is still in the forest waiting for an opportunity to, in coordination with the Bosnian army, make a breakthrough and cross over the front line. Survivors also spoke of rape and killing that took place before they were allowed to leave Srebrenica.

Serbian local council of Srebrenica has been established in the town, the president of which told Radio Pale that "the Muslim population realized that it had been misled by its Ustashi leadership and their Ustashi authorities and that an agreement has been reached about their departure". An unknown number of men aged between 16 and 55 were taken away to Bratunac by the Serbs because of "suspicion that some of them may have committed war crimes", only to be exchanged a short while afterwards for Serbian prisoners of war.

Dutch UN soldiers already stated that they witnessed killings, rape, and other crimes (an unconfirmed figure of 1,600 is being mentioned), in spite of the warning not to talk about such things before leaving the area.

Seeing what the situation is really like, around 4,000 Bosnian soldiers in Gorazde, disarmed the Ukrainian troops (150 of them) but did not touch the 330 British soldiers in the town. The "safe area" of Gorazde, according to UNHCR estimates now has a population of around 50,000. In contrast to Zepa, Gorazde is important for several reasons (besides the fact that there are still Muslims living there): it controls the Drina valley, it is strong in a military sense; it is too close to Sarajevo, and has "Pobeda", an ammunition and explosives factory which is of crucial importance for both sides since it is the only factory in the whole of former Yugoslavia which produces particular kinds of detonators and ignition devices and uses technology which is difficult to introduce elsewhere. Bosnian military industry relies heavily on "Pobeda": at night, devices produced in Gorazde are carried in back packs and on horse back to other ammunition factories. "Pobeda" is located deep inside a hill and was neatly mined during the first Gorazde crisis; it has to be assumed that in case of an attack the whole factory will be thoroughly destroyed.

On Thursday Radovan Karadzic offered another of his favourite exchanges of territory: you give us Gorazde, because you "don't need it" and in return we'll give you parts of Sarajevo which is to remain divided. It resembles his earlier offers: we will give you Knin, you give us access to the sea; we'll give you Dubrovnik, and you give us Sarajevo and a pack of cigars each. These kind of offers are usually called "reckoning without one's host" or "counting one's chickens before they are hatched". It is easy to threaten; Gorazde must be taken first. The example set by Srebrenica and (God forbid- Zepa!) will only enhance the determination of the defenders of Gorazde even if the world powers, UN and NATO fail to lift a finger- as they probably will. In spite of all, Karadzic was quite honest in the interview he gave "El Pais" and a Washington radio station: there will be no Muslim enclaves in Eastern Bosnia or in the words of the local nationalists- Drina will be "the backbone, not the border of Serbiandom".

Last week, all around the world, plenty of diplomatic and media noise was made on the subject of Gorazde. The "moral credibility of the UN" was discussed, capture of Srebrenica and Zepa and ethnic cleansing were condemned, concern about the prisoners was expressed, "the break up of the UN and NATO" was mourned, etc. However no one came out of last week any wiser, or relieved. The options being spoken of range from sending 10,000 troops into Gorazde to total UN withdrawal from Bosnia.

When this issue of Vreme appears on the news stands, on Friday, July 21,

the Contact Group and other interested countries will be holding a meeting in London. It seems that as usual, everybody waits for everybody else to do something about the reconciliation of opinions. The French are still asking for military engagement in Gorazde as a sign that a line has been drawn which Mladic must not cross (Alain Juppe, Thursday afternoon); the British favor the option "if nothing else, at least more air strikes" an option also favored by the US Secretary of Defense, William Perry, who suggested attacks on Serbian radar and anti-aircraft systems. The American administration also got entangled with the Senate about lifting the arms embargo on the Bosnian Muslims, something their European allies consider the worst possible option amounting to "washing their hands" of the whole issue.

It appears that the only option around which there is not too much disagreement concerns the opening of the Igman road, as the first step towards lifting the blockade of Sarajevo. For such a move one must first complete the Rapid Reaction Force, which is still waiting for the arrival of the 24th British Airborne division. At the moment, their base is being built in Ploce, after a delay due to problems with the President of the Bosnian-Croat Federation, Kresimir Zubak, a builders firm and the local council.

The meeting on Friday could bring something new but the chances of that are quite remote. Neither the great powers, which are in dispute, nor the UN, paralyzed and disgraced, nor Milosevic who is silent, nor Karadzic who met virtually no resistance in Eastern Bosnia have thought of anything new. Why then should the London meeting mean anything.