EU Takes Over for U.N. in Bosnia

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina — The European Union hoisted its dark blue banner Wednesday to officially mark the transfer of peacekeeping duties from the United Nations, while NATO-led troops handed over control of Sarajevo’s airport to Bosnian authorities.

The U.N.’s mission concluded Tuesday after a decade in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The EU takes over the world body’s postwar mandate of reforming and monitoring the local police force to ensure it is professional and does not include members who committed crimes during the 1992-95 Bosnian war.

Sven Fredriksen of Denmark, who headed the U.N. police mission and who will also lead the EU police mission, promised to help build a police force that “serves and protects all people unconditionally,” regardless of ethnicity. He spoke Wednesday at a ceremony at the former U.N. headquarters here.

The EU police mission includes about 500 international officers who will be deployed in Bosnia along with local police. The EU mission, the first of its kind organized by the union, is set to end in 2005.

U.N. peacekeepers were deployed in Bosnia at the start of the war. When it ended, the mandate changed to police reform.

About 15,000 troops who are part of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization-led stabilization force are also deployed in Bosnia. On Wednesday, they handed over control of the Sarajevo airport to Bosnian authorities. French peacekeepers had managed the air traffic control and airport property since 1992.

Also Wednesday, Paddy Ashdown, the international envoy overseeing Bosnia’s reconstruction, urged the nation’s politicians to hasten economic reforms and increase the pace of privatization.

“We are competing with our neighbors for investment and jobs,” Ashdown said.

Ashdown has the power to impose laws but often prefers to urge local politicians to take measures he says would bring the country forward.

In a New Year’s message, he also said Bosnia faces a better future.

“I believe 2003 can be the year in which the hard work and goodwill of the people of Bosnia is rewarded with better times,” Ashdown said.