BUILDING PEACE IN THE BALKANS : Former Foes Choose Barter Over Bullets in Boundary Dispute

For nearly four years, the mountain people of northeastern Bosnia battled Serbian tanks, bullets and bombs. They lived in holes in the ground and lost many loved ones, yet somehow hung on to the villages of their births.

But when negotiators met in Dayton, Ohio, last year to forge a peace agreement for Bosnia, the farmers of six shattered Muslim villages lost all they had fought for with the stroke of a pen.

To the horror of these weary Muslim fighters, the Dayton map-makers accomplished what the rebel Serb army could never do: They carved the six villages out of government-held territory and handed them to the Serbs.

“For all four years, the Serbs tried to get into our village and they could not,” said Muso Salihovic, the mayor of Nezuk, whose wife refused to flee and was killed by a Serbian shell. “It makes us very unhappy if they just get it on the negotiating table.”

While most people in Bosnia-Herzegovina--including Salihovic--welcome the peace brought by the U.S.-brokered accord, the Dayton agreement has spawned numerous boundary disputes that may be difficult to resolve.

On both sides of the cease-fire line, people in areas to be transferred from one jurisdiction to the other swear they will never live under their enemy.

In the suburbs of Sarajevo, some Serbs are digging up their ancestors’ bones before they leave territory that will come under control of the Muslim-led government. In central Bosnia, Croats have torched and looted buildings in towns they must turn over to the Serbs.

With continuing uncertainty over the return of millions of refugees to their homes, many question whether the promise of the Dayton pact can be fulfilled.

But here, just 10 miles east of the U.S. air base in Tuzla, the villagers are trying something that, in Bosnia, is unusual: They are negotiating with their foes.

Using a provision of the Dayton accord that allows for realignment of boundaries, the Muslim farmers have proposed giving the newly created Republika Srpska, or Serb Republic, four pockets of land where many Serbs live in exchange for the cluster of six Muslim-dominated villages.

They hope for a peaceful resolution of the issue but are determined to fight again for their villages if they must.

“Dayton didn’t leave us helpless but gave us room to negotiate,” said Camil Ahmetovic, the regional official who is representing the Muslims in talks with the Serbs. “There is a possibility to solve this problem. We have signed the agreement, and we are going to try to live by Dayton. If it does not go smoothly, we will have to deal with it by other means.”

When Bosnian Serbs first rebelled in 1992 against Bosnia declaring independence from Yugoslavia, they pushed to establish a 12-mile-wide corridor west of the Drina River, the border between Bosnia and Serbia. But the rebel advance was stopped three miles from the river when it reached the cluster of Muslim villages: Zaseok, Nezuk, Mahmutovici, Kovacevici, Andjelici and Vrela Strana, with a combined prewar population of 4,000.

The fighting was so intense that in some villages more than 90% of the houses were destroyed. Rather than leave, some residents dug holes in the ground, where they were better protected from the Serbian shelling.

“If you have kids, you have to defend them when you see tanks coming toward your village,” said Redo Salihovic, the mayor of Zaseok, who is not related to the mayor of Nezuk. “They barged in a few times, but they never managed to keep it, and they never will.”

In Zaseok, Mustafa Ibrahimovic is living in his garage while he attempts to rebuild his ruined house. The gray-haired, 69-year-old shoemaker said he put down his tools and picked up a rifle when the village came under attack.

Many Serbian soldiers died at the hands of the villagers, he said, and he fears that the Serbs will exact revenge if Zaseok becomes part of the Serb Republic.

“All we want is to live like we lived before,” he said, standing by the road in his camouflage uniform. “We can live peacefully, but we know how to kill too.”

Ahmetovic, the regional official who is turning gray at 30, said the Bosnian army lost nearly 1,000 soldiers defending the villages; the Serbs, he said, lost 4,500 soldiers in their repeated assaults.

“Much blood was shed here,” he said. “This is part of what makes the area so special. The whole pocket was incredibly difficult to defend. People really suffered a lot.”

After the Dayton agreement was reached, the local people believed that the new line separating Muslim-led Bosnia from the new Serb Republic would be the same as the cease-fire line, leaving the six Muslim villages on the Muslim side of the boundary.

But the zigzag course of the cease-fire line was straightened out, and an area of about 3 square miles containing the villages was placed in Serbian territory.

Ahmetovic said he has had five meetings with the Serbs to negotiate a land swap and is optimistic that an agreement can be reached.

Under the current proposal, the Serbs would get slightly more land, but in areas that are less densely populated.

Top officials in the Serb Republic and the Muslim-led Bosnian government have agreed to try to negotiate a settlement, which would need the approval of a joint civilian commission created by the Dayton agreement.

If the boundary can be corrected, the Muslim villagers said, they can live agreeably under the Dayton accord, including sections that seek to impose American political ideals such as free elections, freedom of speech and prohibitions on discrimination.

“We have such freedoms right now, and we think it’s working quite well,” said Salihovic of Zaseok. “I can always say what I think, and nobody can do anything.”

For the Muslims, the question is whether the Serbs will honor such rights. If Muslim and Croatian refugees are allowed to return home to Bosnian Serb territory as the Dayton accord requires, and if truly free elections are held, the leaders of the Serb Republic could find themselves voted out of power by a Muslim-Croatian majority.

“If people are free to return to their houses, we will be a majority there, and then the Serb Republic will be nothing,” Ahmetovic said. “Are they so naive they are going to lose it?”

But above all, the people of the six villages are anxiously awaiting this early test of the Dayton agreement to see if it is flexible enough to give back the villages they fought so hard to save.

“I can tell you what the people think,” said Salihovic of Nezuk. “They were born here and want to stay. It is their home. There is no chance we are going to move.”