Croats Besieged in Bosnia Monastery Get Lift Out From British

A night of talking didn’t help. So the British opted for action Wednesday to rescue 181 Bosnian Croat civilians from Muslim troops trapping them in a monastery.

Ten at a time, the Croats were evacuated in Warrior armored vehicles.

The rescue was the culmination of efforts that began the day before when the Croats flooded into the Franciscan monastery to flee fighting between Croat and Muslim forces in the surrounding hills.

Fighting in the Travnik region has been the fiercest between the two former anti-Serb allies. Travnik fell to the Muslims on the weekend, but fighting continued nearby on Wednesday.

A British patrol of six Warriors found the group late Tuesday afternoon and took up defensive positions around the building.

The peacekeepers stayed all night as U.N. negotiators argued in vain with the forces of the Muslim-led government encircling the monastery to let the civilians go.

Snipers fired into the monastery courtyard, panicking the Croats, many of them old or children. Two Warriors returned fire, letting loose several hundred rounds from their 30-millimeter rapid-fire cannon.

Inside the monastery, Margaret Green, an American with the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, told the Croats that their choice was simple--stay put or get out with the British, but without most of their possessions.

“I don’t want to leave my dog and cow behind,” a small boy wailed.

The refugees left, climbing aboard the Warriors, which passed through Muslim and Croat lines without incident. The refugees were dropped off at their temporary new home--an old school in Croat-controlled Novi Bila, four miles outside Travnik.