US stands aloof as Serbian guns batter Gorazde

BOSNIAN Serbs launched infantry and shelling attacks yesterday against the Muslim enclave of Gorazde for the sixth day running, according to Sarajevo television.

But the US government rejected a plea from the Bosnian government for Western intervention to defend the UN 'safe area', one of six declared last year. Asked if the US was willing to let Gorazde fall to the Serbs, the Defense Secretary, William Perry, said: 'We will not enter the war to stop that from happening. That is correct, yes.'

UN sources believe the attacks will continue in the short term, but do not believe the Serbs will make significant gains, as the terrain round the pocket favours the defence. Instead, the Serbs are expected to continue their usual tactic of terrorising civilian areas with artillery fire.

The Bosnian Serb leader, Radovan Karadzic, yesterday ordered his police to arrest all people suspected of involvement in the outbreak of 'ethnic cleansing' in the Serb-held town of Prijedor. At the end of last week at least 20 civilians - 18 Muslims and two Croats - were murdered in Prijedor, a mainly Muslim area in northern Bosnia deep inside Serb-held territory.

Some were shot, some killed by hand grenades and some burnt in their homes. The Red Cross has mounted an operation from Zagreb to evacuate the rest of the Muslims and Croats.

Mr Karadzic said: 'The perpetrators of the crimes will be tried and severely punished before the eyes of the international public.' He instructed all civilian and military authorities to provide safety for all minorities in the town and to co-operate with the International Committee of the Red Cross. Bogdan Delic, the police chief in Prijedor, told Reuters by telephone that some arrests had already been made in connection with the murders and promised the 'criminals will face justice'.

Despite the continuing violence, the UN is optimistic that the Serbs will soon join the peace agreement negotiated between Muslims and Croats. Throughout central Bosnia the Muslim-Croat truce which came into effect on 25 February is holding, with the British battalion in the former Croat pocket of Vitez having the quietest day since they arrived nearly six months ago.

Fighting between Muslims and Serbs has continued on the western edge of the Maglaj finger, where the Croats who were formerly allied with the Serbs have changed sides. The large amounts of unexploded ordnance have given rise to many reports of ceasefire violations which have turned out to be incorrect. UN sources said on Saturday that a reported mortar exchange between Croats and Muslims in Vitez was probably mines being set off, and another large explosion in Vitez, at first thought to be a mortar or artillery attack, was caused by a dog that trod on a mine.

In an appearance on the NBC TV Meet the Press programme yesterday the UN military commander in Bosnia, Lieutenant-General Sir Michael Rose, said deployment of American troops in Bosnia would accelerate moves toward peace. But Mr Perry, speaking on the same programme, rejected this appeal. He said the US would send troops only when all three sides had signed a peace agreement. 'We are prepared to send a substantial number of troops to sustain a peace agreement once a peace agreement is reached,' he said.

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