Croatian Role in Bosnia

My short conversation with Carol J. Williams in Zagreb recently was misrepresented in “Croatia Risks Cutting Its Own Throat,” news analysis, Jan. 15.

I did not explicitly nor implicitly say that “Croatia can somehow annex part of Bosnia without sacrificing its own territorial integrity.” On the contrary, I emphasized that Croatia strongly supports the organization of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a union of three republics as the only viable solution at this time. We would have certainly preferred other more assertive solutions, but we should not be blamed if our wishes did not come true.

Croatia does not set the rules for the new world order. My government has always viewed the mediation of the international community, from the Vance plan for Croatia and the Cutilliero plan for Bosnia to the present Owen/Stoltenberg plan for Bosnia, as fair under the circumstances. Our primary concern every time was to stop or minimize the bloodletting. Is this immoral?

There should be no illusions anymore about what the international community was and is prepared to do in Bosnia. Croatia cannot save Bosnia alone. We have certainly tried. My government has perhaps contributed more to the defense of Bosnia and Herzegovina than any other. A September, 1993, congressional commission report said that Croatia’s role in Bosnia differed “more in form than in goal from the type of multilateral intervention many were advocating the U.N. to take on Bosnia’s behalf.” Further, our contribution for the care of mostly Muslim Bosnian refugees easily outdistances the contribution of even the United States by more than $300 million.

We have done all this because it is in Croatia’s interest to maintain the territorial integrity of Bosnia and Herzegovina. We remain steadfast in that the best chance for keeping Bosnia together is peace, even if it is in the form of the Owen/Stoltenberg plan. More war, without Western assistance, will only make the polarization among the three communities in Bosnia all the more permanent.

AMBASSADOR MARIO NOBILO

Permanent Representative of Croatia

to the U.N., New York

Paul Conrad’s cartoon (Jan. 12) wherein a Bosnian woman prays for inclusion in “Schindler’s List” is a terrific satire for a selfish world which only speaks for powerful people and forgets the plight of the weak. Conrad’s pen really gives a powerful voice to the holocaust of the voiceless. Unfortunately this would not wake up hypocrite politicians. Good luck, Conrad!

A. VASAN

Yorba Linda