Word: owen
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...other hand, intervention in the name of the only conceivable solution -- partition along lines proposed by the Vance-Owen mediation -- is at least rational. If bombing Serbian guns or arming the Muslims would bring the recalcitrant Serbs around, then intervention might make sense...
What to do? Give all sides an ultimatum: Accept the Vance-Owen partition, or else. Serbs risk aerial bombardment, Muslims risk total abandonment...
...true that Vance and Owen appear hopelessly overmatched trying to bring Anglo-Saxon-style conciliation to a place ravaged by byzantine blood feuds. It is no surprise that the Geneva talks have collapsed. Mere mediators cannot force an agreement. Which is precisely why Western governments should be providing the muscle behind the mediation. They should be putting the heaviest pressure -- including threats of intervention -- on Serbs and Muslims to accept the Vance plan. (The Croats have already done...
Instead the mediation is being undermined by American signals of nonconfidence. The new U.S. Secretary of State has already "expressed doubts" about whether the negotiators "can, in fact, find an agreement." With backing like that, Vance and Owen would be lucky to find the door...
Whether the Vance-Owen plan is the key to peace is questionable. It would force the legitimate Bosnian government, which represents other ethnic groups in addition to the Muslims, who make up 44% of the population, to accept partition of the country. The two mediators have designed an elaborate scheme for twisting Bosnia into 10 autonomous provinces, to be ethnically apportioned among Muslims, Serbs and Croats. The patchwork blueprint can hardly be mapped, let alone offer a structure capable of standing up to the waves of hatred that flow through the real Bosnia. Rather than tamping down ethnic animosity...