Bosnian Serbs

After 10 days of talks at the United States embassy in VIENNA, Austria, the Muslim-led Bosnian government and Bosnian Croats agreed on a draft constitution for a future federation between their peoples in Bosnia.The final agreement is due to be signed in Washington at the end of the week. U.S. mediator Charles Redman said the next stage would be to bring the Bosnian Serbs into an overall peace settlement.A NATO air strike ordered after Bosnian Serbs attacked French peacekeeping troops was averted when the Serbs withdrew near BIHAC in northwest Bosnia.

Quitting the game over money is the new National Pastime.If only we could send the Bosnian Serbs against the Hutus and both against North Korea.By U.S. law, any Cuban who gets here stays here, but the Coast Guard still can -- and will -- interdict them at sea and ship them back to Fidel.Maryland is slowly, mindlessly, drifting into a two-party democracy.

What's visionary is not always art, and vice versa.Bosnian Serbs were sold out by Serbia in the Dayton accord but will comply because their own army never existed. It was always Serbia's.With the collapse of the Powell and Specter balloons, moderate liberals have found their place in the Republican Party: outside, looking in.After she snared the Prince, Diana did not live happily ever after. Yet. This fairy tale is not over.

UNITED NATIONS -- Western diplomats say that President Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia has accepted a compromise plan for monitoring the trade embargo he has imposed on the Bosnian Serbs.In return, the diplomats told the New York Times yesterday, the Security Council will move to ease sanctions on his country as early as next week.The United States, Britain, France, Germany, and Russia -- the "contact group" of countries trying to make peace in Bosnia -- had announced that if the Serbs agreed to allow international observers to watch their borders, the economic embargo against Serbia would be progressively relaxed.

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia -- Russia is expected to advance a new initiative on Bosnia that would grant the Bosnian Serbs the same constitutional rights as the other two warring parties -- the Muslims and Croats.The plan will be presented Friday in Brussels, Belgium, at a meeting of foreign ministers from Britain, France, Germany, Russia and the United States, according to diplomatic sources. The five powers comprise the so-called Contact Group on Bosnia.Elements of the plan have emerged here after two days of talks between Russian Foreign Minister Andrei V. Kozyrev and Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic.

ZAGREB, Croatia -- NATO warned the Bosnian Serbs yesterday that if they did not accelerate the withdrawal of heavy weapons ringing Sarajevo in the next 24 hours, attacks by NATO warplanes and missile strikes on Serbian positions would resume.United Nations officials said the Bosnian Serbs had withdrawn only a dozen artillery pieces and tanks from the heights overlooking the city, despite promises made Thursday to pull out some 200 heavy weapons in exchange for an end to NATO air attacks on Serbian positions.

GENEVA -- The United States, Russia and the European Union agreed yesterday to seek fresh economic sanctions against Serbia in reprisal for the Bosnian Serbs' rejection of their peace plan last week. But they shied away from other, tougher measures, such as lifting the arms embargo on the Muslim-led Bosnian government.After a six-hour meeting here, Secretary of State Warren M. Christopher and the foreign ministers of Britain, France, Germany and Russia defended their decision as consistent with a step-by-step approach aimed at persuading the Bosnian Serb leadership to accept their proposed territorial division of Bosnia.

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina -- Sharp dissent emerged at the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo yesterday over the Clinton administration's decision to change its policy and engage in direct negotiations with the Bosnian Serbs despite their rejection of an international peace plan.The dissent centered on what one official described as attempts by the State Department to oust the U.S. ambassador to Bosnia, Victor Jackovich, who has always opposed direct talks with the Bosnian Serbs until they accept the peace plan.