HAZY NEGOTIATIONS

AIM, ZAGREB, November 9, 1994

Such a turnover and no profit whatsoever! Negotiations between the Croats and the Serbs have been going on in the past few days at three levels: Zagreb-Knin, Zagreb-Beograd, and indirectly within the mini group Z-4, but no news that anything has moved from a standstill is coming from any side.

There are not too many bones of contention, but they are so deeply rooted that it is of no help that they can be summarized in one sentence. Knin gives priority to the economy and trade, but Zagreb finds that insignificant until resolutions are implemented on the political integration of Croatia, Milosevic would like to continue with the "normalization" of the past winter, which is now too little for Tudjman, who wants mutual recognition, and all this flows into the retort of group Z-4 whose mysterious plan is emphatically supported only by Croatia, Belgrade is politely reticent, while Knin is adamantly opposed. All three negotiating positions are thickly shrouded in ambiguities, tacticizing and behind-the-scene moves, while things are actually much clearer than anyone is willing to admit. One could even say that there are no more dilemmas about the most important issue, namely the certainty of the reintegration of Croatia.

In point of fact, it is preferable to say "some sort of reintegration", because it is impossible even roughly to assess how long it will take, which degree of autonomy will it bring to the Croatian Serbs and, what is most important, whether Croatia will have to pay dearly for it by giving up border territories towards Serbia and Montenegro. All that is quite sufficient to make the ongoing multi-tiered negotiations continue floating in a Bermuda triangle, which will, for God knows how long, be demarcated by three completely opposite timings: quick (Croatia), slow (Serbia) and never (Knin). Croatia's insistence on speed turned into an ultimatum last week: Sarinic, upon returning from Knin, said that Croatia demanded the agreement with Knin to be signed by the 21 of the month or it would abandon it, and Tudjman intensified the threat saying that otherwise he would cancel UNPROFOR's mandate.

This already ritual antagonism against the peace forces is connected with a promise not very firmly made to Croatia, but which its diplomacy, for lack of anything better, sets much store by. Namely, this summer, the documents of the Contact Group, and later Resolution 947, for the first time, contained a formulation on the mutual recognition of Yugoslavia and Croatia in their existing borders, giving the normalization "without specific time limits" agreed this winter between Jovanovic and Granic, some sort of a backbone which should be aspired after.

This too did not contain any specific deadlines, but it was evident that the focus of international mediators, up to then concerned only with Bosnia, had started shifting towards Croatia. Zagreb evidently wanted to take advantage of these new developments. That is why the position taken already this spring, that the announced Tudjman-Milosevic meeting would not take place until Yugoslavia recognized Croatia, was transformed into the cornerstone of Croatia's foreign policy, and it has been insisting on it to date. The only concession was made when it was agreed nevertheless to renew contacts between Zagreb and Belgrade, which was initiated on Friday, but still not on the level of heads of state but rather of that of heads of diplomacy, with fresh emphasis being laid on the fact that these negotiations might be discontinued if they failed to result in mutual recognition.

There is no satisfactory explanation why Zagreb is in such a hurry. It is widely thought that as regards reintegration time is more on Zagreb's than Knin's side, since economic and increasingly political and even military (though least of all) comparative advantages are on its side.

Apart from that, the hands on this clock have already caused discord within the block of "Serbian lands" so that a quarrel with one does not automatically mean a quarrel with all. But, Tudjman persistently demands that the lifting of the sanctions against Yugoslavia be linked with the settling of the situation in Croatia, so that it is possible that he fears that Belgrade will "slip through his hands", i.e. that it will become an even more difficult negotiator (as it does not expect much of the negotiations in any case, so that it might prolong them indefinitely) once the sanctions are lifted.

Croatia, nonetheless, does not have all the time in the world, primarily because of the impatience of the exiles who are loyal for the time being, but only because the authorities shower them every day with promises of fast return, and do not even shirk from channelling their dissatisfaction at the live targets of other endangered categories of the population (evictions from flats of the former YPA are cooly justified with the words that "aggressor families" occupy them, while their victims live in hermits shacks). But, the first time they notice that they are left out of the usual daily policy phraseology, the exiles may break loose and the entire structure of lies and manipulations may tumble down on the head of the authorities.

The second, no lesser reason for haste is the persistent insistence of international mediators, primarily the USA and Germany, to bring the Croato-Bosnian Federation at least to the level of a "grudging" alliance, which after much troubles they seem to have achieved. Moreover, the military cooperation of Croatian and Bosnian formations in the battle for Kupres shows that more progress has been achieved than known to the public, and the probable engagement of regular units of the Croatian Army in those battles confirms that Zagreb is willing to invest more than could have been anticipated in the new-old alliance.

Now the only unknown is how this will affect Croatia's relations with the Serbs. That question is, indeed, asked less dramatically today than yesterday, for while the Bosnian Serbs and the Bosnian Croats are warring, Serbian representatives are travelling to Zagreb, which may be a telling message to Karadzic that Belgrade no longer cares what will happen to him. But for the time being, Belgrade has not carried over that indolence to Knin and its denizens are evidently not indifferent to the fact that Bosnian-Croatian forces are attacking them from the right flank, threatening to cut them off from the Serbian hinterland.

Thus, Serbia can, nevertheless, not be publicly proclaimed disinterested in what is happenning in Bosnia. This again means that Croatian-Serbian relations are slowly returning to the problem of Bosnia and the idea to solve them in parallel or even earlier in Croatia than in Bosnia - which explains the large diplomatic ado in Zagreb - is proving illusory. This is also contributed to by the persistent and loud resistance of most of the Croatian opposition and discreetly of a part of the ruling HDZ (Croat Democratic Union) to negotiations with Belgrade and Knin, especially now, when it seems, for the first time, that the military positions of the Bosnian Serbs have been undermined.

Pressures are also growing for Zagreb finally to dissolve the two-year long concubinage with Belgrade and return to the love nest with Sarajevo, which has already partially happened. But, irrespective of whether that is a definite orientation or only a short term manouvre, it is clear that B&H is no longer a country for the peaceful settling of accounts between the Serbs and Croats, and it is joining the game as a relatively strong third player, one better to have on one one's side than as one's enemy. Its advantage is that on the world diplomatic scene it has the least problems in getting support for its actions, including those of a military nature (only the Bosniacs are admittedly waging a "liberation" war). In this way, the previously mentioned triangle of interests is definitely turning into a square, which further prolongs the incubation of political solutions in this space, including the solution of Croato - Serbian relations.

The pressures Zagreb is trying to direct at Milosevic so as to extract an express recognition have poor prospects because it is evidently assessed that Milosevic has made much concessions at the Drina river and that it would be too much to expect him to immediately give way at the Danube too. Thus Croatia can expect nothing more, nor significantly more, from international mediators, from what it already has and Tudjman's statement made last week to the effect that what the papers write about the plan of Z-4 does not suit Croatia, shows that hope is fading that something will be done through this informal center of world power, i.e. by circumventing the slow-boat procedure of the regular world institutions.

It turns out that only deep political changes in Croatia itself could break the standstill. But, if that were realistic to expect, this whole story would not seem so troublesome and complicated and would, perhaps, not be even necessary.

MARINKO CULIC