Bosnian Croats Accused of Muslim Village Massacre : Balkans: U.N. troops find 15 bodies and 52 burned houses. They had been kept out of the area for three days.

U.N. peacekeepers accused Bosnian Croat forces Wednesday of massacring Muslims in a village north of Sarajevo, where U.N. troops found at least 15 bodies and all 52 houses burned down.

The peacekeepers entered Stupni Do on Tuesday after being forcibly kept out of the village for three days by Croats seeking to hide the massacre, a U.N. statement said.

“It is clear that the (Croatian) troops were attempting to hide from us the atrocities they had committed” during Saturday’s attack, the statement quoted Gen. Jean Cot, commander of U.N. forces in the former Yugoslav republics, as saying.

U.N. troops were threatened with weapons and several of their armored vehicles were damaged by gunfire and grenades, the statement said.

The 15 bodies the peacekeepers found Tuesday included “a group of women, holding each other’s arms, who had been shot to death,” it said. Others had been burned to death.

The U.N. statement said two young women from a group of 25 refugees who escaped the village accused the attackers of rape. The whereabouts of many of the estimated 250 people who lived in Stupni Do, 20 miles north of the capital, were unknown.

Bosnian Croats denied that their units massacred the villagers and said any fighting in the area was to defend against attacks from Muslim-led government troops.

Croatian radio reported counter-allegations of a massacre Tuesday by government forces in Rastovci, a village near Novi Travnik to the northwest. The radio said seven bodies were found. U.N. officials could not confirm the report.

Croatian and Muslim-led government forces fought together against Bosnian Serbs early in the war, which started when Bosnia seceded from Serb-dominated Yugoslavia more than 18 months ago. Their alliance has collapsed in fighting for land in central Bosnia not occupied by the Serbs, who hold 70% of the country.

Meanwhile, one of two renegade army commanders hunted down on charges of criminal activity was shot to death trying to escape in Sarajevo, the government said.

Musan Topalovic, known as Caco, was killed as he tried to escape from a government vehicle early Wednesday, the government said.

The other, Ramiz Delalic, known as Celo, was in “special investigative custody,” officials said.