ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, December 13, 1995 TAG: 9512130069
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: PARIS
SOURCE: Associated Press
Amid tears and laughter, two French airmen shot down over Bosnia arrived in the arms of their families Tuesday after nearly four months as captives of the Bosnian Serbs.
The return of the pilots, whose Mirage 2000 was downed while conducting NATO air strikes in August, ended a 104-day ordeal that had threatened to disrupt the signing of the Bosnian peace accord in Paris on Thursday.
Their first breaths back on French soil rose as frosty plumes caught in the floodlights of national TV.
``Today with all the French I pay homage to their courage,'' President Jacques Chirac said in a live television address shortly before he greeted the men with a handshake.
It was a touching scene that warmed the hearts of a nation embittered by a nearly 3-week-long labor strike: ``Les pilotes'' were finally home, and in time for Christmas.
In Washington, President Clinton told France's new Ambassador Francois Bujon ``to convey to President Chirac the joy of all Americans that these pilots were free.''
French and U.S. officials denied rumors that they had cut a deal with the Bosnian Serbs for the men's release.
``No deal at all,'' said Chirac spokesman Jerome Peyrat.
Sources in Pale, the Bosnian Serb stronghold, said that with the pilots freed, rebel leader Radovan Karadzic expected to attend the signing of the peace accord in Paris, where he would lobby against a provision in the treaty that reunites the capital under Muslim-Croat rule.
But White House press secretary Mike McCurry said that if Karadzic or Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic - both suspected war criminals - arrived in Paris, ``they would be under arrest.''
Early Tuesday, the airmen, looking pale and tired, were handed over at a motel overlooking the Drina River in Zvornik, a Bosnian Serb-held town close to the Serbian border.
``We were very well treated,'' Souvignet told reporters in Zvornik. ``But it wasn't always easy because my leg troubled me.''
Souvignet did not say where he and Chiffot were held, but said they were kept in two adjacent rooms for most of their captivity. ``We could speak sometimes,'' he said.
At first, they communicated with their captors in English. ``Later, we learned some words in Serbian to ask to drink and to eat,'' Souvignet said.
As they were handed over, Mladic wished the pilots ``the best of luck.''
Their homecoming was a made-for-TV reunion carried live across France. Floodlights bathed the tarmac as the military plane taxied to a stop Tuesday evening at the Villacoublay air base outside the capital.
Families huddled around their TV sets, and in Paris, people peered through the plate-glass windows of electronics shops to watch as Lt. Jose Souvignet, the co-pilot injured in his parachute jump, limped but smiled as he stepped off the plane.
LENGTH: Medium: 61 linesby CNB