BOSNIA: US IFOR SOLDIERS MOBBED BY BOSNIAN SERB CIVILIANS

(7 Jul 1996) Eng/Serbo-Croat/Nat

A group of Bosnian Serbs has mobbed and threatened IFOR soldiers accompanying a peace force negotiator to a heavily guarded Bosnian Serb military compound.

IFOR descended on the compound to try to establish if Bosnian Serb heavy weapons - which had been spotted outside their designated areas - had been moved back in.

But the mob believed the troops had come to arrest the Bosnian Serb commander and indicted war criminal General Ratko Mladic who lives at the compound.

Eventually the Bosnian Serbs complied with the I-FOR demands and took all their heavy weapons back into their proper areas.

American I-FOR soldiers were mobbed by about 200 Bosnian Serb civilians late Saturday in front of the Bosnian Serb army headquarters in the town of Han Pijesak.

The heavily-guarded compound is also the hideaway of Bosnian Serb commander and indicted war criminal General Ratko Mladic.

The U-S soldiers were harassed by the angry crowd.

The civilians screamed at I-FOR soldiers to leave, pushed them and threw stones at I-FOR vehicles.

Many excited civilians - waving the Bosnian Serb flag - stated that they would die to defend Mladic - they believed that the I-FOR soldiers were attempting to arrest him.

A British peace force negotiator, Brigadier General Michael Charles Weedy, met senior Bosnian Serb generals to try to calm the situation.

He said I-FOR was only trying ensure that a number of Bosnian Serb tanks and APCs sighted outside the base in violation of the Dayton accord had in fact returned to base.

However, he could not confirm if this had happened.

SOUNDBITE:
"You've got to remember we have a great big peace process going on here and we have the occasional minor perturbation. My job is to assist the VRS (Army of Republic of Srpska) in its compliance with the peace agreement and to do everything I can to help them get to the far end of this year and to achieve the completion of the peace process and to bring peace to this country that its people so richly deserve. And we have the occasional minor problem but we mustn't get them out of all proportion, the prize of peace is far bigger than any minor problem. "
(Question: What about the tanks?)
"If you look at the track marks on the road that might suggest to you that the tanks are already gone from there and to here and if you look behind you. Thank you very much"
(Turns to Bosnian Serb officer)
"I just want to say, I'm going to tell him what I'm doing. I'll just walk out and talk to John and I'll come back in."
SUPER CAPTION: Brigadier General Michael Charles Weedy, British peace force negotiator

A Bosnian Serb officer also tried to calm the crowd which demanded weapons.

They shouted at him that they were not going to leave until I-FOR left.

SOUNDBITE: (Serbo-Croat)
"We will not give our generals and commanders. We don't give up Radovan and Mladic. Their heads are not that cheap. They better try to get us to cooperate."
SUPER CAPTION: Voxpop

The I-FOR soldiers finally moved their tanks away from the crowd but I-FOR rejected Bosnian Serb demands to leave the base altogether.

As they withdrew, several U-S vehicles were hit by stones.

However, by Sunday the situation was resolved.

The I-FOR Chief of Staff, Lieutenant-General William Carter, said at a news briefing in Sarajevo that all the heavy weapons had been returned to their designated areas.

But he added he believed the harassment of the I-FOR troops had been deliberately orchestrated to make I-FOR's job more difficult.

SOUNDBITE:
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