Western European Union Agrees to Have Troops Available to U.N.

The long-dormant Western European Union agreed Friday to make its military forces available, if requested to do so by the United Nations, for humanitarian and peacekeeping duties in such trouble spots as Yugoslavia.

After a meeting near here, the nine-member group’s foreign and defense ministers said in a statement:

“All WEU member states will soon designate which of their military units and headquarters they would be willing to make available. . . . Member states intend to develop and exercise the appropriate capabilities to enable the deployment of WEU military units by land, sea or air to accomplish these tasks.”

WEU Secretary General Willem van Eekelen said that union forces might be used in situations where troops of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization “could not or would not participate.”

Founded in 1955, the WEU--now made up of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg--was long inactive but has lately been revived as a possible independent European force.

The ministers’ statement declared that “the WEU is prepared, within the bounds of possibilities, to contribute toward effective implementation of U.N. Security Council resolutions in connection with the conflict in the former Yugoslavia.”

But member nations steered clear of suggesting they would intervene on the ground in the Yugoslav conflict. British Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd said member countries would study how their troops might be used to enforce U.N. sanctions against Serbia, although he said he did not foresee sending combat troops.

On the other hand, Germany’s new foreign minister, Klaus Kinkel, said that military force “should not be excluded” if U.N. sanctions against Serbia fail.