EC Endorses Force if Needed for Sarajevo Aid

Appalled by the conflict ravaging what used to be Yugoslavia, the 12 European Community leaders Saturday endorsed relief shipments, with U.N. military protection if necessary, to the besieged former Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The 12 EC heads resisted Italian efforts to authorize the use of European troops in advance of Monday’s scheduled meeting of the U.N. Security Council.

Instead, the leaders, “while giving priority to peaceful means,” said they did not “exclude support for the use of military means by the U.N.” to open the airport in Sarajevo, the Bosnian capital, which has been closed by Serbian troops and Serb irregulars opposed to Bosnia-Herzegovina’s independence. The airport’s closure has made relief shipments of food and medicine all but impossible.

The European leaders also held out the possibility, if authorized by the United Nations, of eventual direct military support by the nine EC members that also constitute the Western European Union. WEU military experts have begun reviewing what role its members’ armed forces could play in a humanitarian aid effort.

French President Francois Mitterrand flew from the EC meeting bound directly for Sarajevo with the apparent intention of making a personal effort to mediate in the conflict. His plane landed Saturday night at Split, about 100 miles west of Sarajevo on Croatia’s Adriatic coast, and French news reports said that Mitterrand hopes to fly into the beleaguered Bosnian capital by helicopter this morning.

The French leader told a news conference here shortly before leaving: “We have a moral obligation to help. Serbia is today the aggressor and we cannot wait.”

Mitterrand’s surprise initiative drew frowns from Western officials in the United States who said that Serbian forces had been cooperating well with Western demands before the French president’s venture and that they had hopes that a cease-fire would be in place by the Sunday deadline given to the Serbs on Friday by U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali.

The officials said that Mitterrand’s decision to travel to Bosnia infused the entire process with an air of uncertainty.

The EC’s formal actions here were in line with U.S. efforts to increase diplomatic pressure on Serbia, which has shrugged off the trade embargo and other economic sanctions that the United Nations has already imposed.

They came one day after Boutros-Ghali threatened Serbia with unspecified consequences--presumably military intervention--if it did not lift its siege of Sarajevo within 48 hours.

Despite that threat, Serb forces, ostensibly seeking to protect the ethnic Serbian minority in Bosnia-Herzegovina, shelled downtown Sarajevo and a suburb Saturday. Sarajevo’s 300,000 residents are running out of food, water and medical supplies.

Bosnian authorities said 7,440 people had been killed and 26,700 wounded in 11 weeks of carnage. Another 35,000 were listed as missing, and 1.4 million have been driven from their homes.

In Washington, President Bush’s national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft, appeared to minimize the chances of full-scale U.S. military intervention in the region.

Describing the war-ravaged land as “a very, very difficult political situation,” Scowcroft said in a CNN interview: “To talk about walking in there and dealing with the problem that is as intractable probably as that which has been going on in Northern Ireland or in Beirut is a dangerous thing to do.”

Asked if he would rule out U.S. air attacks on the mortars and artillery that have been firing into areas of Sarajevo populated by civilians, Scowcroft said: “I’m not going to rule things in or out at this point.” At their meeting in Lisbon, most EC leaders hewed to the same line.

German Chancellor Helmut Kohl said: “It is clear that military force cannot be ruled out.” His foreign minister, Klaus Kinkel, added: “All are agreed that the murder, the killing and the senselessness really must be ended at once.”

Italy, taking the most hawkish stance, was willing to move in advance of U.N. action to authorize European troops to open the Sarajevo airport and escort relief shipments to the city. “Italy fought . . . to have more specific, more precise language,” said Italian Foreign Minister Gianni De Michelis.

Britain was the most cautious of the 12 EC countries. Prime Minister John Major urged that relief shipments wait for an effective cease-fire.

“We must wait to see whether it is practical, whether it is feasible to get people in and out of Sarajevo airport safely,” Major said.

British Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd, asked whether troops could be sent in before a reliable cease-fire, said after the summit: “It is for the Security Council to make this judgment.”

The EC leaders lined up with the United States in ruling out the claim of Serbia, along with its ally Montenegro, another republic of the former Yugoslav federation, to be the successor state to Yugoslavia.

Serbia and Montenegro argue that the other four former Yugoslav republics, including Bosnia-Herzegovina, have all declared their independence. The EC leaders said they would not recognize Serbia and Montenegro as Yugoslavia’s successor--which would give them Yugoslavia’s U.N. seat and membership in other international organizations--”until the moment a decision has been taken by the qualified international institutions.”

Times staff writers Art Pine and Ronald J. Ostrow, in Washington, contributed to this story.