Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 17, 1993 TAG: 9304170272
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: The Washington Post and Knight-Ridder/Tribune
DATELINE: SARAJEVO, BOSNIA LENGTH: Medium
BOSNIAN TOWN NEAR SURRENDER
The east Bosnian town of Srebrenica, packed with thousands of Muslim refugees, appeared ready Friday to negotiate its surrender to Bosnian Serb forces, and the United Nations announced it was sending in 150 Canadian peace-keeping troops "to avert a major humanitarian tragedy."An announcement by the French Foreign Ministry that Serb forces entered Srebrenica late Friday night could not be confirmed immediately. Bosnian officials in Sarajevo denied the report.
U.N. sources in Sarajevo, the Bosnian capital, said an advance party of about 20 Canadians was expected to enter Srebrenica today, with the agreement of Radovan Karadzic, leader of the Bosnian Serbs, and Slobodan Milosevic, president of neighboring Serbia and chief backer of the Serb forces in Bosnia.
U.N. officials were reported preparing for a possible massive evacuation of thousands of Muslim civilians from Srebrenica across mountain roads to Tuzla, a Bosnian government stronghold 40 miles to the northwest.
The fall of Srebrenica, one of three remaining Muslim-held enclaves in eastern Bosnia, would have major implications for international efforts to halt the yearlong war that has killed at least 20,000 and perhaps more than 100,000 people in the former central Yugoslav republic. Bosnian Serb leaders have rejected a U.N.-brokered peace plan, signed last month by both the Muslim-led government in Sarajevo and Bosnian Croats, that would put the east Bosnian region under Muslim control as part of a division of the republic into 10 semi-autonomous provinces.
In Washington, President Clinton reacted to the day's developments by saying the United States and its allies should consider intervening in ways that "previously have been unacceptable."
"At this point I would not rule out any option except the option that I have never ruled in, which is the question of American ground troops," Clinton said. He was responding to a reporter's question on whether he was considering the use of air strikes against the Serbs.
Clinton stressed that the United States will only act in coordination with its allies.
"Whatever is done must be done within the framework of multilateral cooperation," Clinton said at White House news conference after a meeting with Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa of Japan.
By underscoring his determination to act multilaterally, Clinton signalled that his options for punishing the Serbs are extremely limited. President Boris Yeltsin of Russia, under fire from hard-line opponents who say he should be supporting Serbia, is reluctant to impose any more penalties on Serbia before a referendum on his performance is held April 25. A senior defense official confirmed that the administration was considering using air strikes against Serb artillery positions in Bosnia. However, the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, also said the United States would only take such action with the approval of its allies.
Bosnian Serb leader Karadzic told the British Broadcasting Corp. he was negotiating with U.N. commanders to have the town's lightly armed defenders "hand over weapons" to the U.N. troops. If that is done, he said, Bosnian Serb forces "will not enter Srebrenica," but only "pacify" the town.