CONTENTS Festive greetings to all our readers, and here's to a prosperous New Year for the international class struggle.
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'Cantonisation" gains
International Viewpoint #251 December 1993
T HE day after the proclama-
tion of the European Union (EU), its twelve member states decided to "relaunch the peace process in Bosnia" at the request of Alain Juppé and Klaus Kinkel, the French and German foreign ministers. According to the ministers it is "a step towards unity for ex-Yugoslavia." In reality it leaves on one side the questions of Kosovo, Vojvodine
The EU has two immediate concerns: firstly, the humanitarian convoys, and secondly, the search for political agreements in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovi-
The EU intends to demand that the protagonists agree to keep the promise which they gave the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) on 18 November: that aid will get through. From 25 October, following the death of a Danish driver, the UNHCR stopped all its convoys. Militants who drove three International Workers' Aid lorries had, by bravery and luck, reached the region of Tuzla in mid-November. They found a starving population, who were amazed that they had reached their destination, for with its 600 thousand refugees, Tuzla has suffered a triple blockade, by the Serb and Croat militias (the main obstacle to the convoys), and also the UNHCR, which, in stopping the convoys, for whole weeks left thousands of people besieged without food or medication. That appears to have been a cynical political choice: Tuzla Airport could have been re-opened some months ago. Alain Juppé has been quite explicit: it is not a question of agreement between the belligerents, rather that if the "Muslims" do not agree to the dismembering of Bosnia, humanitarian aid will cease after winter. Is the signing of an agreement through hunger a "principle" of the EU and the United Nations (UN)?
The Serbs have been asked to find a "modus vivendi" (way of living) in Croatia and to restore to the "Muslims" anywhere between three and forty percent of their territories. If that were to happen there would be progressive lifting of sanctions. The Croats have been asked to accept a stage-by-stage settlement of the conflicts around Krajinas and to permit access to the sea by a Bosnian state. They
EDITORIAL ground would then obtain economic aid. The EU would then "invite the Muslims" to sign the agreement — who would be assured of assistance in reconstructing "their State". The Owen-Stoltenberg (in reality Milosevic-Tudjman) plan would therefore be accepted, there being the formation of three republics — which would bear little resemblance to a Bosnian Union.
Alain Juppé explicitly justifies the above position: "Whatever our preference for a united Bosnia-Herzegovina, the three sides, and also the Sarejevo government, are working on the basis that there will be three separate republics." He does not state that this was the choice of Radovan Karadzic and Mate Boban (who have supported "ethnic cantonisation" since March 1992). The principle of three ethnic republics is only reluctantly accepted by the "Muslim" and Bosnian side. It is far from supported by the mixed urban populations, particularly in central Bosnia. However, there is little alternative, given the inequality in armaments and the suffering of 3.5 million refugees within ex-Yugoslavia and 760 thousand asylum seekers outside.
Three republics
It is true that at the end of July Alija Izetbegovic accepted the principle of a Union comprised of three republics. On 16 September he even signed, with Radovan Karadzic, a declaration envisaging the right to secede (by way of a simple majority in a referendum) two years after the coming into existence of such a Union. On 29 September the Bosnian parliament (which has lost the majority of its Serb and Croat deputies) did not reject the plan in principle but did set out conditions which would have to be met: a viable State, access to the sea, guarantees from the UN and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and special status for Mostar and Banja Luka. The idea was clearly to gain time while a military counter-offensive was launched. The exhaustion of the besieged populations caused by the war, and the aspiration of some Muslims for their "own State" are realities bearing on whether the future State will be "Muslim" or "Bosnian". Were the recent purges in the Bosnian army aimed only at "war criminals" "hard-liners", or rather at military leaders who had different ideas of the nature of the State to be defended or instituted?
All that is clear at present is that the struggle must continue in each State against "ethnic cleansing", whatever agreements are signed. Catherine Samary *
Step forward for solidarity
AT a conference in Manchester,
England in November, attended by delegations from Austria, Belgium,
Denmark, France, Hungary, Ireland,
Italy, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden, as well as Britain, International Workers'
Aid was formally constituted to build international solidarity with the people of Bosnia and the workers of the Balkans.
The meeting agreed the necessity for political, material and humanitarian aid, on the following principles:
• Solidarity with the workers of the
Balkans;
• No to ethnic cleansing and ethnic partition;
• Solidarity with multi-ethnic Bosnia;
• Asylum rights for those fleeing the war in ex-Yugoslavia.
Adopting a resolution from the Scandinavian delegation, it was agreed to establish international co-ordination within a loose structure and by decisions made by consensus, although campaigns in individual countries will be free to adopt their own slogans.
Immediate plans include the following:
• Developing on-the-spot contacts, knowledge, and channels for aid to unions, women's groups and peace groups who resist the war and national chauvinism;
• Launching a campaign demanding the opening of Tuzla Airport to humanitanan aid;
• Preparing now for a new, larger convoy, at the beginning of the new year. Alan Thornett *
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