U.N. Chief Empowered to Retake Bosnia Enclave

The Security Council on Wednesday unanimously authorized Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali to use all available resources to retake the enclave of Srebrenica in Bosnia from rebel Serbs. But his chief military adviser belittled the idea.

The resolution, which condemned the Bosnian Serb offensive, did not say what military or diplomatic resources the secretary general should use in restoring the status quo in Srebrenica.

And most ambassadors acknowledged privately that they did not expect any bold military action by the United Nations. A more outspoken Brig Gen. Frank van Kappen of the Netherlands, Boutros-Ghali’s adviser, said in a news conference at U.N. headquarters in New York: “For what purpose? What are we going to prove?” He said that saving the lives of more than 30,000 Muslim refugees under nationalist Serb control in the Srebrenica area must be the United Nations’ priority.

“In the forefront of our mind at this moment is the safety of the refugees,” the Dutch general said. “The safest way to get them out is to negotiate. If you try to get them out by force . . . the damage to the refugees would be tremendous.”

But French Ambassador Jean-Bernard Merimee, echoing an earlier pledge by French President Jacques Chirac, expressed his country’s willingness to undertake military action. “We are ready, if the military and civil authorities of the U.N. force deem it possible, to put our forces at the disposal of any operation that these authorities feel is useful and feasible,” he told the council.

Because the French have the largest number of peacekeepers in Bosnia-Herzegovina, news of the Srebrenica debacle has evoked angry reactions in France. French newspapers dubbed the fall of the enclave the United Nations’ “Waterloo,” while French leaders said that an international military effort to retake it was the only hope for saving the troubled peacekeeping effort.

“We cannot leave Srebrenica with our tails between our legs,” Prime Minister Alain Juppe said after a high-level meeting of his government ministers in Paris. “We cannot accept this as a fait accompli, which would make [the U.N. mission] completely meaningless.”

Chirac, addressing the French Senate, said the time had come for the U.N. forces to draw the line with the Bosnian Serbs, and meet force with force. “If the international community doesn’t react now, then one has to wonder what the U.N. is doing there,” he said. “If the security enclaves are not respected, and if the one at Srebrenica isn’t re-established, the entire mission is in doubt.”

Despite this fiery rhetoric from the French, it was clear that the major powers at the United Nations had reached no decision about their next move in the Bosnian crisis. That was underscored by passage of the Security Council resolution, for it gave Boutros-Ghali a lofty mission but provided no means or even suggestions on how to carry it out.

Representatives of what is known as the Contact Group--the United States, Russia, Britain, France, and Germany--assembled in London on Wednesday night in an attempt to devise a joint policy for the future.

The Contact Group, all Security Council members, has been trying for more than a year to pressure the Bosnian Serbs into accepting a peace agreement with the Muslim-led Bosnian government. The rebel Serbs, however, have balked at a map that would leave them with no more than 49% of Bosnia when their battlefield victories have given them more than 70% of the territory.

News of the fall of Srebrenica has naturally led to speculation that withdrawal of the U.N. peacekeepers, known officially as the U.N. Protection Force, is inevitable. Since President Clinton has pledged to make 25,000 American troops available for any NATO operation that protects such a withdrawal, U.S. officials are hoping that it won’t be necessary.

Shortly before the Security Council voted on the resolution, U.S. Ambassador Madeleine Albright said the Clinton Administration “firmly believes” that the peacekeepers, supported by a French-British-Dutch rapid-reaction force, should remain in Bosnia. U.N. officials believe that the rapid-reaction force, recently authorized by the council, will be ready for action before month’s end.

Albright acknowledged that the U.N. peacekeepers have “a difficult mission that requires tough decisions under often intolerable conditions” and that their “leadership . . . will need to make even tougher decisions in the days ahead.” But she added that the United States “believes that the role of NATO--to which we have committed significant resources--will be vital to those decisions.” Her mention of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization appeared to be an allusion to the alliance’s air strikes, which have so far proven too limited to halt nationalist Serb offensives in Bosnia.

Strong support for the United Nations’ continued presence in Bosnia came from State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns. He told a news briefing that, as far as the United States, the international community and the Balkans are concerned, “there are no good alternatives.” But the “preferable” one, he said, was a continued U.N. mission with allied support.

“This is not the time to leave our allies in the lurch, it’s not the time to desert them when their backs, some of them, are against the wall,” he said. “It is a time to stand with them.”

In France, officials look on the new, 12,500-troop rapid-reaction force as a way to free the Dutch troops and retake Srebrenica, and they want the United Nations to give it the go-ahead. “Let us see if the force answers our hopes,” said Philippe Seguin, president of the French National Assembly.

Meisler reported from Washington and Kraft from Paris. Times staff writer Norman Kempster in Washington contributed to this report.