Bosnian Serbs Cheer Arrival of 400 Russian Peacekeepers

Hundreds of Bosnian Serbs cheered the arrival of 400 Russian peacekeepers Sunday, lining the streets of the rebel stronghold of Pale and offering gifts of food and slivovitz, a local brandy distilled from plums.

The Russians were redeployed from peacekeeping duty in Croatia as part of an agreement brokered by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Vitaly Churkin, the Kremlin’s special envoy on the Balkan crisis.

The Russian pledge to deploy the peacekeepers--while urging the Serbs to withdraw their weapons from around Sarajevo--gave Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic a way to pull back without seeming to bend to NATO.

However, some of the Russian troops who arrived in Serb-held areas of the capital on Sunday said they understood their assignment here to have been made on condition there would be no North Atlantic Treaty Organization air strikes.

“The compromise was worked out so that if we Russians are here, there will be no need for air strikes,” said Alexander Koznov, a chief warrant officer and 20-year veteran of the Soviet and Russian armies. “We are here because we are the only people the Serbs trust.”