Yugoslavia and Slovenia Seem Headed for War

The Yugoslav army and Slovenia appeared headed for an all-out war Monday after trading charges of violating a cease-fire and threatening to take whatever measures necessary to defend their territory.

The Serbian-dominated high command in Belgrade ordered a massive mobilization of 200,000 “appropriate” reservists. Residents of the federal capital said young men were being stopped by police for random conscription checks.

The Slovenian Defense Ministry claimed that federal helicopters fired on civilians near Vrhnika, southwest of the capital, and combat aircraft buzzed Ljubljana and other cities on surveillance runs that set off air-raid alerts.

Slovenian President Milan Kucan appealed to the West to recognize and aid his embattled republic, which along with the republic of Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia last Tuesday. Kucan called for international monitoring of the shaky cease-fire and foreign control of the republic’s airspace, and he also insisted that Slovenes must control their own borders.

“There is a barbaric aggression in Slovenia, and the war is still going on,” Kucan said at a news conference.

But there were signs that Slovenia’s territorial defense forces were impeding some army moves toward complying with the truce brokered over the weekend by a European Community delegation.

Slovenes blocked columns of tanks on sun-baked highways as federal troops attempted to retreat to their bases from border crossings that have been the scene of intense gun battles.

The Slovenian irregulars--bolstered by their success in resisting a two-day federal blitz last week--appeared to be trying to force more of the desertions that have humiliated the 180,000-strong federal army.

Federal recruits have been cooped up in full combat gear inside their armored vehicles for the past five days during the standoff with the Slovenes, often without adequate food and water. Slovenia cut off supplies and electricity to federal bases after the Yugoslav army launched its attack last Thursday.

More than 2,000 soldiers, officers and federal police have surrendered to or been captured by the Slovenian forces since the deadly clashes began, Slovenian Information Minister Jelko Kacin said.

At least 63 people were killed in the fighting, and officials put the number of wounded at 142.

In a harshly worded warning, the federal army high command in Belgrade said it has mobilized “appropriate reservists”--presumably Serbs and Montenegrins who are opposed to dividing Yugoslavia. The military leadership also said it has made senior personnel changes to ensure efficient execution of orders and warned would-be deserters that “any betrayal of the Yugoslav People’s Army will be short-lived.”

Slovenian television announced late Monday that the high command has sacked Gen. Konrad Kolaek, a Slovene who heads the 5th Military District, which includes Slovenia. The move is sure to ratchet-up tensions between Slovenes and the federal army.

The statement issued by the hard-line Serbian Communists who command the Yugoslav armed forces blamed Slovenes for breaking the peace accord and warned that the army “will act decisively.”

“The forces of the Yugoslav People’s Army are at the highest combat readiness,” the high command warned.

It also accused Slovenian defenders of abusing military personnel and their families living in the republic, likening the secessionists to World War II fascists.

While the military statement heightened fears of an impending assault on the already tense and barricaded capital, a similarly ominous warning of attack issued Saturday was never fulfilled.

The federal forces include 2,000 tanks and nearly 400 combat aircraft. But much of the equipment is considered ill-suited to the guerrilla warfare likely in Slovenia’s mountainous and forested territory. Dozens of tanks deployed during the army’s two-day offensive that began Thursday broke down or were knocked out of commission by grenades.

The cease-fire agreement announced late Friday, then shored up two days later after repeated violations, calls on Slovenia and Croatia to put off further steps to independence, urges the federal army to withdraw to its garrisons and seeks a restoration of the collective federal presidency.

The latter condition was fulfilled early Monday when Serbia ended a six-week blockade of the federal leadership and let Croatia’s Stipe Mesic take his turn as head of state.

Mesic summoned the eight-man presidency to Belgrade for its first meeting since mid-May. The ruling body, which is now dominated by Serbs, issued a declaration seeking support for the previous Yugoslav federal structure until a new alliance among the six republics can be negotiated.

Slovenia’s delegate to the presidency, Janez Drnovsek, refused to take part in the session, signaling Slovenia’s determination to continue acting as a sovereign state outside the Yugoslav fold.

The high command in Belgrade complained that “armed formations in the territory of Slovenia are treating (federal troops) as an unfriendly and an occupying army.”

Slovenia’s leadership has repeatedly characterized the federal troops as invaders and has appealed for mass desertions by other nationalities unwilling to take part in subjugating a sovereign state.

“These troops can return to their bases with full guarantee for their safety, but they must leave their equipment there,” Slovenian Defense Minister Janez Jansa said of the federal army units ordered to retreat.

Kacin, the information minister, told reporters that there would be no full-scale troop withdrawal until federal army and Slovenian officials worked out “technical details.”

Defense Minister Jansa said the question of who will keep the military equipment--presumably mounted guns and ammunition--would be decided in negotiations on “war reparations.”

In neighboring Croatia, ethnic strife has escalated in the wake of declared independence. At least 37 people have been killed during the last week in ethnically mixed regions of the republic of 5 million, where the 600,000-member Serbian minority vehemently opposes secession.

The official Tanjug news agency reported renewed fighting in Borovo Selo, where a dozen Croatian police officers were killed in an ambush last month.

Slovenia, a republic of 2 million, has few ethnic minorities and little internal opposition to its secession.

On the contrary, determination to permanently extricate the republic from Yugoslavia has intensified in the wake of the federal intervention.

In Vienna, meanwhile, a new European crisis-prevention system faced its first test Monday as 35 nations met to discuss the conflict in Yugoslavia and try to ensure that the cease-fire will hold, Reuters news service reported.

The members of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE)--all of Europe plus the United States and Canada--met under the aegis of a Conflict Prevention Center founded last year to add teeth to the 16-year-old CSCE process.