Nato lets Serb army evacuate suburbs

LIAM McDOWALL Associated Press

Sarajevo - A convoy of Bosnian Serb army trucks under Nato escort was ready to roll into the demilitarised areas of the capital today to evacuate thousands of Serbs before the Muslim-Croat federation takes over. The operation - planned to relieve the suf fering of Serbs fleeing in panic from the suburbs - was criticised by a UN official, who said Serbs who want to stay in the city would be frightened into leaving. Vehicles were being assembled at Lukavica barracks, a military camp in a Serb-held region south of Sarajevo, said a Nato spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Mark Rayner. "The fewer Serbs remaining in Sarajevo, the worse it is for the efforts here to piece the country together again," said the spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Kris Janowski. He acknowledged "a lot of them want to leave", but said the UN would not participate in the evacuation because "we want them to stay ... the whole of Sarajevo is at stake here, and the issue of multi-ethnicity of the country". Concerned about Serbs trudging through the snow with belongings on their backs, or Muslims stoning Serb convoys, Admiral Leighton Smith, the American commander of the Bosnia peace-keeping mission, said his troops will provide security for the Bosnian Ser b military to withdraw the Serbs from Sarajevo suburbs. The number of vehicles, their routes and the terms allowing use of military vehicles in demilitarised areas were being kept secret. Colonel Rayner said military licence plates would be removed and the drivers would wear civilian clothes. Before the war, more than a quarter of greater Sarajevo's half-million population were Serbs. They now make up about 10 per cent of the 300,000 people left. Under the Dayton peace accord, five Serb-held districts of Sarajevo are to beturned over to the M uslim-Croat federation by 19 March. The first step was to demilitarise Sarajevo's front-line areas, as to allow military vehicles back in could cause problems. Serb residents are also being pressured by their leaders into fleeing to the nearby Bosnian Serb stronghold of Pale. Colonel Rayner said: "Since they have clearly taken the decision to move [we are] simply providing the security and the movement control in which they can move in an orderly way." Tens of thousands of Serbs are believed to have fled Vogosca, the first di strict to be handed over, in terror of the federal police who entered the suburb on Friday. Nato and UN officials said some of the police were frightening the few Serbs who remain in Vogosca. "If the Bosnian government is genuinely interested in keeping those people ... they have to rein in the federal police and leave these people alone," said Mr Janowski. "They committed themselves to not [make] house calls, not search cars, not stop vehicl es," he added. While the federal police have been "perfectly polite" when they knock on doors to ask if weapons are being kept in houses, "considering how paranoid the people already are ... they are scared by the sight of them".