Yugoslavia Says Croats, Serbs Agree to Truce

The Yugoslav presidency Tuesday proclaimed “an absolute and unconditional cease-fire” in Croatia, only hours after senior Croatian officials said they had launched a major offensive to recover considerable territory lost to Serbian rebels.

The collective presidency meeting in Belgrade said Serbian militants and Croatian government officials had agreed to halt all shooting as of 6 a.m. today.

While the declared truce offered hopes of a lull in the fighting, there was little indication of a breakthrough in the escalating conflict that has plunged Yugoslavia into civil war.

The official Tanjug news agency’s announcement of the cease-fire made no mention of negotiations between Serbian and Croatian leaders, whose nationalist policies have forced Yugoslavia’s two largest ethnic groups into a seemingly inescapable bloodletting.

Serbian militants who have captured at least 15% of Croatia’s territory in recent days may have agreed to the presidential call for a respite out of concern that Western Europe might punish further aggression by siding with the Croats. Also, if Croatia abides by the cease-fire, the Serbian territorial seizures will go unchallenged, allowing the rebels to strengthen their hold on the contested towns and villages.

The truce poses major political risks for Croatia, where support for President Franjo Tudjman is already showing signs of erosion. But Croatian authorities may have agreed to the plan to buy time to bolster their defenses and to appear committed to a peaceful solution in the eyes of Western governments.

A senior Croatian Defense Ministry adviser insisted in an interview only a few hours before the declared cease-fire that Croatia is switching strategies by abandoning its defensive posture despite the risk of provoking a massive intensification of the fighting.

Zagreb will announce formation of a full-fledged army within the next few days, and the republic is prepared to impose martial law if necessary, the adviser, Antun Abramovic, said in an interview.

Officials also claimed that Croatia has secured new supplies of heavy weaponry and that a secret commando raid on the Serbian stronghold of Knin inflicted major casualties among the rebels.

In the Netherlands, European Community diplomats held crisis talks to consider proposals for curbing violence in Yugoslavia, including appeals for an armed peacekeeping force to separate Serbian and Croatian combatants.

They issued vague statements in support of further efforts by Europe and the United Nations toward a negotiated solution, but made no firm decision on the proposals for military involvement.

Ethnic and political clashes have killed more than 300 since Croatia and Slovenia declared independence from Yugoslavia six weeks ago, prompting concern among European neighbors that the violence may spread to other areas of the Continent.

Serbia has made clear it would oppose any armed foreign intervention, and Croatian leaders have also said such a move would likely allow Serbian guerrillas to hold Croatian territory while negotiations on an elusive settlement dragged on.

“We want peacekeeping forces but not those that would fix boundaries and separate present positions,” Croatia’s foreign minister, Zvonimir Separovic, said at a press conference.

“If a line were drawn where these terrorists have fixed their positions with army help, that would have exactly the effect they (Serbia and the army) want--the amputation from Croatia of parts of its historical territory.”

Abramovic, chief spokesman for the Defense Ministry, said Croatia would find itself in the position of Cyprus, where a Turkish occupation has divided the island state for more than a decade and achieved the level of a status quo while efforts at a negotiated settlement have been fruitless.

Several of the EC countries have expressed reservations about deeper involvement in the volatile and dangerous Yugoslav conflict.

“We are not being asked to peace-keep. We are being asked to peace-make, and that is quite a different proposition,” British Foreign Office Minister Douglas Hogg told reporters in London before leaving for a meeting with other representatives of the 12-nation EC in The Hague.

In a statement issued through the official Soviet news agency Tass, the Kremlin warned the West against military intervention in Yugoslavia, saying it would threaten security throughout Europe.

The Netherlands and Portugal have indicated they are opposed to military involvement in Yugoslavia unless the conflict escalates into massive fighting, and German Defense Minister Gerhard Stoltenberg has reminded European neighbors that the German constitution forbids foreign deployment of troops except to NATO countries.

Germany and Austria have instead hinted that they might recognize the sovereignty of Croatia and Slovenia unless Serbia stops trying to thwart a diplomatic solution.

“The Austrian federal government is considering the recognition of Slovenia and Croatia as an option,” Chancellor Franz Vranitzky said Tuesday. The German government issued a similar statement Monday.

Serbia refused to attend weekend negotiations with European mediators, scuttling their attempt to restore peace and control the breakup of the 73-year-old Yugoslav federation.

EC officials accused Serbia of “stonewalling” their effort to avert further bloodshed, and the Western alliance has taken a softer line against the breakaway republics as a result.

The 35-nation Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe will also take another stab at peaceful resolution of the Yugoslav crisis when it convenes a special session in Prague on Thursday.

Scattered fighting continued Tuesday in ethnically mixed regions of Croatia, and several officials said Serbian rebels were stepping up a campaign to take Petrinja, an important industrial city only 30 miles south of Zagreb, the Croatian capital.

In response to staggering territorial losses suffered over the last two weeks, Croatia has decided to reorganize its military forces and focus troops on retaking strategic towns now under Serbian control, Abramovic said as the presidency was at work on the cease-fire agreement.

Western diplomats in Zagreb confirmed that Croatian forces had recently assumed a more aggressive posture.

“They realize their strategy of defense and propaganda was mistaken, and both of these are now going to be corrected,” one envoy commented.

Croatian Interior Minister Ivan Vekic said the republic recently received substantial shipments of antitank weapons and other arms from abroad but refused to say how much was obtained or which countries supplied it.

In a surprising and possibly exaggerated claim, Abramovic said special units of the Croatian national guard attacked Knin late Sunday and killed as many as 60 Serbian militants.

Meanwhile, in Belgrade the head of Serbia’s largest opposition party accused the republic’s Communist leadership of being behind a political assassination.

Two gunmen shot to death Branislav Matic-Beli, a leading activist with the Serbian Renewal Movement, outside his Belgrade home late Sunday.

Opposition leader Vuk Draskovic blamed the killing on forces loyal to Serbia’s Communist strongman, President Slobodan Milosevic.

“There are indications that Serbia’s leadership organized this political murder,” Draskovic said. “This could be done only by those who had the state behind them.”

Troubled Croatia

Capital: Zagreb Population: 4.8 million Economy: Industrial and agricultural History: Croatia came under Hungarian and Hapsburg rule in 1091. In 1918, Croatians formed a kingdom with the Serbs and Slovenes, later named Yugoslavia. Croatians proclaimed their own state during World War II and allied with the Nazis. After the war, Croatia became a republic in reconstituted Yugoslavia.

Ethnic Breakdown in Croatia

Over 50% Croat majority

Over 50% Serb majority

Others: Includes smaller regions with concentrations of Bulgarians, Hungarians, Muslims, Slovaks and areas with no majority over 50%.

Source: Central Intelligence Agency