Bosnian President Faults Sarajevo Plan

GENEVA —  A day after Bosnia’s warring factions tentatively agreed to demilitarize Sarajevo and put it under U.N. control, the republic’s Muslim president cast doubt on the plan Tuesday, saying it won’t end the Serbian siege of the city.

And Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic said that talks on carving up the country into three ethnic states are stalled because of differences over Muslim enclaves in eastern Bosnia-Herzegovina.

“There are no results in sight,” Karadzic said, adding that the Muslim-led government must be prepared to make a “man-like” deal to break the deadlock.

Muslims say Serbs shouldn’t be allowed to keep areas where they conducted the worst atrocities and “ethnic cleansing” campaigns.

“We discussed the maps all day for 10 hours but I don’t see any progress,” Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic said.

Izetbegovic also put in doubt the tentative accord on Sarajevo reached Monday night. “I can say I’m not happy with this paper as I don’t see it immediately lifting the siege of Sarajevo,” he said.

The three warring factions agreed in principle for Sarajevo to be demilitarized and put under U.N. supervision in a plan designed to lift the Serbian siege.

But Izetbegovic said that mediators Lord Owen of the European Community and Thorvald Stoltenberg of the United Nations had only shown him details of the interim arrangements just before he left the meeting Tuesday. He said he will demand that the lifting of the siege be put on the agenda at today’s meetings.

Under the preliminary plan for Sarajevo, only U.N. forces in the city would remain armed.

In the central Bosnian city of Mostar, overnight fighting between Muslims and Croats reportedly killed 33 soldiers. The former allies have been battling there for months.

U.N. and Bosnian government officials, meanwhile, said thousands of Muslims in Mostar are living in near-bestial conditions, with no aid for two months.

In Sarajevo, three mortar shells slammed into the southwestern neighborhood of Dobrinja on Tuesday, hours after a visit by the U.S. ambassador, doctors said. Thirteen people were hurt.