NATO blocks Serb broadcast

The pre-dawn action - one of the boldest yet by the Western alliance - seemed intended to signal its new resolve to silence Bosnian Serb hard-liners, in particular wartime leader Radovan Karadzic.

"It shows we are willing to take tough, hard measures to make sure there is no mucking around with the Dayton peace process," said British Defense Secretary George Robertson. "This is part of a calibrated and progressive tightening of the screw."

Praising the hundreds of American, French, Italian, Scandinavian, Polish and Russian troops involved in the raids, NATO Secretary General Javier Solana warned: "We will act swiftly against those who do not support" the U.S.-brokered peace accords.

The Bosnian Serb government loyal to Karadzic went into emergency session and issued a terse statement threatening what it termed "a tough reaction" to the NATO move.

Yesterday's raids silenced Serb radio and television for hours. When programming eventually resumed in mid-afternoon, it came from Banja Luka, the base of Bosnian Serb President Biljana Plavsic, who is currently locked in a power struggle with Karadzic. Until yesterday, programming had alternated each day between Pale TV, loyal to Karadzic, and Banja Luka TV, which had not distorted foreign officials' comments or attacked the peace accords.

The NATO force took over four transmitters in the north, northeast, southeast and near Sarajevo. There was no violence, but the potential was there - smaller-scale takeovers of transmitters by NATO-led troops earlier this month drew violent protests by Serbs, egged on by pro-Karadzic radio and television.

NATO helicopters hovered over one transmitter site, on Mount Trebevic near Sarajevo, while armored vehicles blocked all roads linking it to Pale, Karadzic's headquarters. In the northeast, at Udrigovo, peace force soldiers patrolled the area around the transmitter, sectioned off by razor wire. A Bradley fighting vehicle stood nearby.

Next to the transmitter stood a 6-foot wooden cross erected after NATO bombings in late summer 1995 that helped end the Bosnian war. It bore an inscription to Serb soldiers: "Victims of NATO bombings."

A clearly anxious Plavsic appealed last night to foreign officials to restore Pale's programming. Even though the NATO action was "justified," she said, it was clear she was anxious not to rile the Karadzic camp and appear to benefit from foreign intervention.

The immediate cause for yesterday's raids was a Sunday night broadcast on Pale television of a news conference by Louise Arbour, chief prosecutor of the U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands. The Pale broadcast removed Arbour's call for Karadzic to be arrested to face war crimes charges and included commentary suggesting the tribunal was anti-Serb.

The commentary accused the tribunal of "shifting from being a legal institution, to a political instrument aimed at putting pressure on the Serbs," according to U.N. spokesman Alexander Ivanko.

Western anger over the Bosnian Serb media had been mounting for months. In May, the top foreign envoy in Bosnia got permission from NATO foreign ministers to take action against any media accused of undermining the peace accords. The Serbs had been repeatedly warned that their media, especially state radio and TV, were targets for shutdown because of inflammatory broadcasts.

In July, Bosnian Serb television compared the NATO-led peace force to Nazi storm troops after British soldiers had captured one indicted Serb war crimes suspect and killed another who resisted arrest. Peace keepers were constantly vilified by pro-Karadzic media, and several foreign aid workers and soldiers were attacked.

Then a Serb power struggle erupted, splitting TV and other media into rival camps loyal to Karadzic and Plavsic.

Earlier this month, NATO troops seized at least one Pale transmitter and seemed likely to hand control to Plavsic's TV but crowds loyal to Karadzic confronted the soldiers.

In order to avoid more violence, foreign envoys reached a written agreement with Bosnian Serb leaders that their television broadcasts would no longer distort foreign statements and news conferences. That agreement was violated by Pale TV on Sunday.

On Tuesday, Pale TV aired an apology and rebroadcast Arbour's news conference unaltered.

But a spokesperson for Carlos Westendorp, the top civilian official in Bosnia, said yesterday day "that is not enough."

"It is no good and not acceptable ... to say sorry and then expect everything to go on as per normal," spokesperson Duncan Bullivant said.

In a defiant response, Miroslav Toholj, who heads the pro-Karadzic television operation, condemned what he called a blow against "freedom of information and opinion."

10-02-97