A ROMANCE TO THE DETRIMENT OF BOSNIA

Tudjman's secret negotiations with Karadzic and Milosevic?

AIM, Zagreb, June 7, 1995 In the past few days, Croat minister of construction, Jure Radic, opened the new post-office building in Kupres and then, according to the local press, first dialled the phone number of the "President of all Croats", Franjo Tudjman. The whole scene was telecast by the Croat TV, of course, without a single word that anything could be contestable about it. Indeed, the impression is that contributions of this sort are expected to reinforce the conviction of the public that Croatia has already spontaneously fused with Western Herzegovina, without waiting for it to become formally its part.

Such reporting has lasted for months - reports of this kind are included in the TV daily news program almost every day, although the causes are often trite, so that it is impossible to judge whether the temperature of the already cooled Croat-Boshniak relations has dropped even lower. Simply, everything remains the same even when the two parties overcome an obstacle in implementation of the Washington Agreement (which happened quite often lately). In the past few days, this dubious harmony was disturbed by a whole series of angry statements from Zagreb, first of the newly elected vice-prime minister Bosiljko Misetic who is Tudjman's special counsellor for B&H, and then of other high state officials who are considered to be informal leaders of the Croats from Herzegovina (Susak). Boshniak insisting that the president of the B&H HDZ, Dario Kordic, and other Herzeg-Bosnian leaders be punished for war crimes, was qualified by Misetic as "obvious" evidence that "Alija Izetbegovic had not completely given up the intention to earn a Muslim state without Croats, by applying the Serb formula of majority population".

It became evident that Misetic did not try to protect Kordic out of simple homeland solidarity and nostalgy (he is from Herzegovina, too), when a long list of decorations was publicized that Tudjman distributed on the occasion of the Day of the State of Croatia. Almost the entire state and party leaders of "Herzeg-Bosnia" were awarded very high decorations, and such elevation of B&H Vendee will surely be understood by Sarajevo as a great challenge, regardless of the fact that the Croat President "cunningly" tried to prevent anger of Izetbegovic, Ganic and Silajdzic by decorating them too with ancient Croat decorations of the "great orders" and "orders" which were distributed by the bundle recently. The challenge is even increased by the fact that the glorious celebration of the Day of the State coincided with the dramatic developments in B&H, when perhaps more than a hundred people lost their lives in Serb shelling of Tuzla and other cities. For a whole week Croatia gave itself up to celebrating the fifth anniversary of its state, without commenting with a single word these developments in its neighbourhood, and only then did Mate Granic care to condemn shameless attacks against civilian population in B&H, as well as capturing of blue helmets.

Even this took place after the talks with a Turkish delegation in Zagreb, so that a bitter impression remained that the silence would have lasted even longer had not a message been probably conveyed to the Croat state leadership that such indifference towards its formal ally is by far outside the customary limits. But, it is easy to remember that such disinterested attitude became a habit of Zagreb whenever the situation in B&H dramatized (last time it was like this during the severe combats in Bihac pocket), and when its survival was questioned. The impression is established that Croatia has a solution with which it can readily adjust to the most inconvenient outcome for B&H, which is not even concealed. Not long after the NATO bombers had attacked military store-houses in the vicinity of Pale, Croat Minister of defence, Gojko Susak, calmly declared that the priority task of the Croats was to preserve parts of B&H which belong to them in "any version" which might prevail.

To what extent this is practical is another thing, because that which is more or less openly wished for by Zagreb

• that B&H Federation be annexed to Croatia, and then the "Republic of Srpska" may even, if it wishes, go into full integration with Serbia - it is becoming evident, will not pass. It is also becoming evident that international sponsors of the B&H crisis will decline flatly direct appetites of the Eastern and the Western neighbours and try to "enchant" and palliate it with high autonomy but within B&H. In such a situation, Croatia strives to maintain the advantage of the formal alliance with Sarajevo established with signing of the Washington Agreement, and it opposes the similar union of B&H with its neighbour on the other bank of the Drina. In this effort, it primarily alarms its own public, but also everyone else who shrinks from this believing that it leads to a renewal of Yugoslavia (Tudjman was the last to utter such a warning during the celebrations in Zagreb, which was, by the way, the only time he mentioned B&H).

It should be mentioned that even Pale has lately refused the option of direct connection with Belgrade, demanding, for obvious reasons, that the "Republic of Srpska" be first recognized as an independent state. That is why Tudjman probably relies on the fact that Karadzic, should he politically survive the war with the NATO, could perhaps succeed in this and make a profit a part of which would end up in the pocket of Croatia. Such discreet intimacy with Pale passed through an extremely warm-hearted phase last winter, when a rumour went that a delegation from Pale secretly visited Zagreb. It was agreed, as the rumours go, that the two parties would satisfy their needs in Bosnia & Herzegovina by securing territorial gains of Zagreb in Croatia (amputation of parts of the "Republic of Serb Krajina" were mentioned), and Pale would be provided for in Bosnia itself. Judging by the latest developments, speculations about this spectacular exchange of territories are not coming true (even if Western Slavonia was by agreement delivered into the hands of Croatia, nothing seems to have been given to Karadzic as a compensation, unless war "luck" suddenly turns in favour of the Serbs in the corridor).

But, a few days ago, Borislav Mikelic, former prime minister of the Serbs from Krajina, certified that representatives of Pale actually did visit Zagreb, so that the rumours are true at least in the part that the agreement was attempted, but that so far it was fruitless. The main obstacle could be that Pale and Zagreb act according to two completely different models on the international scene. Pale does not shrink from loud undermining and destroying international consensus about B&H, while Zagreb, on the contrary, wishes to make the impression of an obedient cadet of the international community who is the first to readily accept all its decisions (although it mostly does not implement them afterwards). Therefore, it seems even more likely that Zagreb would rather turn towards Belgrade again and towards direct bargaining with it. The somewhat unexpected indicretion of the usually restrained Yasushi Akashi, who stated that the UN were aware of the frequent contacts Tudjman's personal envoy, Hrvoje Sarinic, had with the Serb party, speaks in favour of such a hypothesis.

But, not even a possible new romance between Zagreb and Belgrade will pass without temptations. Milosevic has already strained his relations with Pale to such an extent that he would probably be ready to sacrifice state-creative appetites of the "Republic of Srpska" even more, if that would mean less problems for him at home. On the other hand, Tudjman is hardly limiting the maximalists from "Herzeg-Bosnia" as it is, and he could become too difficult a partner for Milosevic. Just as Karadzic had become for him.

MARINKO CULIC