Bosnia Reports More Bombing by Serb Forces

Serbian aircraft reportedly bombed two northern Bosnian cities Saturday in defiance of a U.N. ban on military flights over the former Yugoslav republic. Serbian leaders denied the report.

Despite the apparent Serbian defiance, the international aid airlift to Sarajevo, which resumed last week after a month’s hiatus, gathered pace with 13 planes bringing in desperately needed food and medical supplies.

But west of Sarajevo, a U.N. peacekeeper from Ukraine was killed and three other Ukrainians were wounded when their armored car struck a mine, said U.N. spokesman Mik Magnusson.

The incident brought the casualty toll among the 15,582-member U.N. force in the former Yugoslav federation to 17 dead and 243 wounded since March.

Heavy fighting was reported throughout Sarajevo and surrounding areas and in Bosnia’s northern Sava River border region with Croatia, where heavily armed Serbs were attacking the few remaining areas controlled by the teetering Muslim-led government.

Bosnian and Croatian radio, quoting correspondents and defense officials, said Serbian combat planes fired rockets and dropped bombs on the northern Bosnian cities of Gradacac and Brcko.

“Destruction is great, and more casualties are feared,” Croatian radio said of the attacks on Gradacac.

Sarajevo television said the aircraft dropped cluster and incendiary bombs as well as tear gas. Bosnian radio reported military overflights at Maglaj, also in the north.

On Friday, the U.N. Security Council voted to ban military flights over Bosnia-Herzegovina, a move directed at the Serbian rebels, who have about 40 warplanes. Bosnia’s Muslims and Croats, loose allies in the fight against the Serbs, have no combat aircraft.

Radovan Karadzic, leader of the Bosnian Serbs, was quoted as denying rebel warplanes were aloft after the U.N. resolution.