Slovenian Official Advises West to Forget Idea of a United Yugoslavia : Balkans: He suggests recognition of 2 republics, puts Serbian-Croatian toll at more than 500.

Two months of fighting between Serbs and Croats have taken more than 500 lives, Slovenia’s foreign minister said Monday in an appeal to Western governments to give up on the idea of a united Yugoslavia.

After talks with Austrian officials, Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel said he was assured that Vienna intends to recognize Slovenia and Croatia as independent nations in the next few weeks.

Acceptance of the two breakaway republics as separate, sovereign nations would ease the bloody conflict gripping the Balkans, Rupel said, claiming that foreign support for a united Yugoslavia has provided de facto sanction for Serbian aggression against the other republics.

“If we do not reform, or do away with Yugoslavia as we know it today, there will be no peace in Croatia and no peace in Slovenia,” Rupel said, warning that continued Western support for the Belgrade leadership could encourage Serbian Communists to try to topple the elected governments of the two breakaway republics.

“The time is now mature for recognition” of Slovenia and Croatia, a member of Austria’s Foreign Policy Committee, Andreas Khol, said during Rupel’s visit.

Khol said that Austrian Chancellor Franz Vranitzky has decided to initiate the process of recognition, and Rupel said he expects a formal declaration within two weeks.

Austria would like to recognize the two Western republics but prefers to do so in concert with other European countries, Rupel said.

German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher on Sunday repeated his warning to Serbia that unless fighting stops, his nation may recognize the sovereignty of Slovenia and Croatia.

Western governments’ reluctance to accept Slovenian and Croatian independence is based on the fear that to do so could unleash an ethnic war in Yugoslavia and encourage a similar breakup of the Soviet Union, Rupel said. “These explosions have taken place without the recognition of Slovenia,” Rupel said.

He contradicted reports by authorities in the Croatian capital of Zagreb that ethnic clashes have claimed about 250 lives, saying the death toll actually exceeds 500 in Croatia since it declared independence along with Slovenia on June 25.

Croatia has lost nearly a fifth of its territory to Serbian militants in the guerrilla war that the independence-seeking republic is losing badly. Croatian officials may be understating the extent of casualties in an effort to prevent further panic and dissent.

Fighting between Slovenia’s territorial defense forces and federal troops ceased after a July 8 agreement that effectively grants the two breakaway republics their independence after a three-month negotiating period.

Yugoslav troops have already begun withdrawing from Slovenia. But the conflict between Serbia and Croatia has steadily escalated and threatened an all-out bloodletting that could claim tens of thousands of lives.

Ethnic Serbs account for nearly 12% of Croatia’s 5 million population, and many oppose independence for the republic because that would sever them from the Serbian republic with which they are bound by the Yugoslav alliance.

The Serbian guerrillas, with the help of Serbian-commanded federal army units, have attacked and occupied most of the ethnically mixed areas of Croatia where Serbs make up a significant part of the population.

Yugoslavia’s fractured collective presidency declared a cease-fire on Aug. 7, but it has collapsed in the wake of continued fighting.

More than 20 people were killed over the weekend, and fighting has reportedly spread to the republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina.