Copyright 2001 Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
The Macon Telegraph
July 27, 2001, Friday
SECTION: INTERNATIONAL NEWS
KR-ACC-NO: K5952
LENGTH: 953 words
HEADLINE: International investigators try to identify thousands of people killed during civil war
BYLINE: By Drew Brown
BODY:
TUZLA, Bosnia-Herzegovina _ The remains of 4,420 people are stacked floor to ceiling in a refrigerated room a few blocks from this town’s central square.
Row upon row of white body bags fill stainless steel shelves in a morgue measuring 50 feet by 100 feet.
Across the hall, workers examine and catalogue clothing and other personal effects recovered with the bodies in a meticulous effort to put names and faces to the legions of dead still missing from Bosnia’s civil war.
The Missing Persons Institute in Tuzla is one of three such facilities in Bosnia. The 1992-95 conflict killed 200,000 people and left another 20,000 unaccounted for.
The nine-person staff of the Tuzla facility is charged with locating and identifying victims of the July 1995 massacre at Srebrenica. The incident was the single worst atrocity in Europe since World War II.
“We (estimate) 10,700 missing persons from the Srebrenica massacre,” said institute official Zlatan Sabanovic. “We expect that we are going to find between 7,000 to 8,000 bodies.”
No one knows for sure how many people died at Srebrenica. Estimates vary from 6,000 to more than 10,000 victims.
Srebrenica had been declared a “safe area” by U.N. officials earlier in the war. Muslim refugees packed the enclave when the Bosnian Serb army surrounded and moved against the outgunned Bosnian government defenders.
As the government army retreated through the mountains, the Serbs overwhelmed a small force of Dutch peacekeepers, who had been ordered by U.N. commanders not to fight. The Serbs took 32 Dutch troops hostage. The Serbs threatened to kill them if NATO warplanes struck the area.
On July 11, 1995, Serb gunmen gathered Muslim civilians at a battery factory and separated the men from the women. They took the men away, and later murdered nearly all of them. The Serbs expelled the women, more than 13,000 of whom ended up in a refugee camp at the Tuzla airport. The location is now Eagle Base, headquarters for the American peacekeeping sector in Bosnia.
Srebrenica was not an isolated incident. Paramilitary forces murdered tens of thousands of civilians, particularly in the Serb-held areas in the east.
Finding and identifying the Srebrenica dead, most of them old men and boys, has been especially difficult because the Serbs dug up the bodies and buried them in scores of secret locations.
So far, officials have found about a dozen secondary mass graves. Institute officials announced June 11 that they have opened investigations at a dozen other sites in eastern Bosnia.
“We expect to find another 1,200 bodies” at those sites, Sabanovic said.
A government official in Sarajevo announced July 8 that forensics experts have uncovered more than 100 sets of remains from several of the new locations.
Only 1,850 of the 4,420 sets of remains in the Tuzla morgue are complete skeletons. Many body bags contain just a few bones. DNA testing has identified only 118 victims so far. Another 73 results are pending, according to Sabanovic.
The process is painstaking. DNA analysis for a single case can take up to six months.
“The International Committee on Missing Persons expects that DNA testing will take around seven years,” Sabanovic said. “Right now, our family outreach program has collected 10,000 blood samples from relatives.”
The identification process also involves a lot of guesswork. Forensics experts try to match clothing and other articles with the remains as best they can. But the bones of several victims often are mixed together, Sabanovic said.
The institute assigns a number to every item and piece of clothing, corresponding to the remains with which they were found. Workers clean these items, photograph them and place them in cold storage with the body bags.
Sabanovic leafed through a catalogue that contained snapshots of clothing and personal effects, with an identification number and a short description listed below each image.
“We have to do this because we don’t have identification cards or other documents with the bodies,” Sabanovic said. “We have to have something with which to start. If someone recognizes something in these books, then we can open a case.”
Last month, about 354 cases were under investigation.
Sabanovic slowly turned the pages. A musty odor pervaded the building. The only sound was the hum of the refrigeration unit in the morgue.
Here was all that was left to identify the dead: a set of striped, tattered underwear. A dirty pair of athletic socks. A denim shirt spotted with dark stains. A cigarette holder. A pair of rubber galoshes. A rotten pair of canvas boots. A patch of blue cloth. Most of them belonged to different victims.
A green shirt lay on the floor, waiting to be photographed. The short sleeves were frayed and rotting. Blood stained the front of the shirt.
Victims’ relatives held a ceremony at Srebrenica on July 11 to mark the massacre’s sixth anniversary. About 5,000 Muslims, most of them women, placed a memorial for their sons and husbands.
A three-ton granite marker sits in a cornfield with the inscription “Srebrenica, July 1995.” Plans call for eventual burial of massacre victims at the site, about 45 miles northeast of Sarajevo.
Srebrenica is in the Serb-held territory known as the Republic of Srpska.
About 2,000 Bosnian Serb police and several hundred U.S. peacekeepers provided security for the event.
Meanwhile, the search for the dead continues. Sabanovic says the work often overwhelms him.
“But it’s easier to work at this facility than it is with the families,” he said. “That can be a very tough job.”
(c) 2001, The Macon Telegraph (Macon, Ga.).
Copyright 2001 Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
The Macon Telegraph
July 25, 2001, Wednesday
SECTION: INTERNATIONAL NEWS
KR-ACC-NO: K5330
LENGTH: 1698 words
HEADLINE: Bosnia’s future could hinge on U.S. commitment
BYLINE: By Drew Brown
BODY:
SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina _ The United States is, in the words of former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, “the indispensable nation.”
Albright made the remark three years ago, as leaders in Washington debated whether to launch air strikes to force Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to comply with U.N. weapons inspectors.
But nowhere in the world, perhaps, is the validity of Albright’s statement more apparent than in this mountainous land of 4 million people, struggling to recover from the worst of five civil wars in the former Yugoslavia.
Bosnia’s future hinges on a number of factors: Economic investment, the arrest of war criminals, and the commitment of the NATO-led Stabilization Force, or SFOR, to see the country through to lasting peace. The United States is by far the most crucial player in SFOR. “The presence of U.S. troops is what makes SFOR strong,” said Alija Behram, general manager of Radio Television Mostar. “Their presence is what gives strength to the liberal forces who want to build and maintain peace.”
About 18,000 troops from 33 nations serve in SFOR, down from 60,000 in December 1995, when the Dayton Peace Agreement ended the Bosnian civil war. The 3,200 American soldiers in Bosnia have a reputation as the most professional and effective peacekeepers in the country. The 1,200 soldiers of the Georgia Army National Guard’s 48th Infantry Brigade make up more than a third of the U.S. force.
“The important thing is not how many Americans are here,” said Avis Benes, a spokeswoman for High Representative Wolfgang Petritsch, the international community’s top official in Bosnia. “The important thing is that the Americans are here. They lend credibility to the peace process. What is important is that the Americans are involved, because when push comes to shove, the Americans are the only ones who get things done.”
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced in May that the military mission in Bosnia was over and U.S. troops should be pulled out. The remark sent jitters through the country.
An American withdrawal could shatter SFOR and lead to renewed war, some observers fear.
“Anyone will tell you that if SFOR leaves, then who knows what will happen,” said a Western diplomatic source in Sarajevo who asked not to be identified. “There are still plenty of guns around.”
Secretary of State Colin Powell later reassured Washington’s NATO allies that American troops would stay in the Balkans “for years,” though at lower levels.
“You can continue to reduce the troop levels, but it will be some time before those countries are free-standing, on their own, and able to handle their own affairs,” Powell told NATO foreign ministers.
Current plans call for American troop strength in Bosnia to drop to 2,800 in October when the 48th Brigade returns home. U.S. military officials have mapped out Army troop assignments in Bosnia through at least 2005.
Outgoing U.S. Ambassador Thomas Miller says fears that the United States will withdraw unilaterally are overblown. “Bosnians know that we are not going to be here forever,” Miller said.
“But … we’re not going to cut and run. We’re not out of here tomorrow.”
Withdrawal has its supporters outside the Bush administration.
Sen. Max Cleland, D-Ga., who voted to send troops to Bosnia, says he has “real concerns” about the mission expanding and supports Bush’s efforts to reduce the U.S. presence.
“I supported the initial year-long commitment, but I wasn’t signing up for what has grown into a six-year engagement, with additional troops in Kosovo and Macedonia,” Cleland said.
Miller and other Western diplomats say their focus is to encourage local authorities to take “ownership” of the peace process.
“Increasingly, this is about Bosnians taking control and responsibility,” Miller said. “We’re not quite at the stage where they can do it all on their own. They do need help, but it’s increasingly about a partnership where we support them rather than order them around.”
Bosnia needs economic investment if peace is to last, most domestic and international observers say.
International donors have poured about $6 billion into Bosnia to rebuild infrastructure destroyed during the war. Bosnia remains largely dependent on foreign aid, but the money is beginning to dry up. Unemployment hovers around 40 percent.
“We need to create jobs. We need to create a modern economy,” the diplomatic source said. “And we need to make a real attempt to build an open political system free of nationalist parties. But more than anything else, we need economic development. That will make peace in Bosnia sustainable.”
But the stable environment required for economic investment remains impossible as long as extremists continue to sow discord and hate.
The 1992-95 Bosnian civil war was the most savage conflict in Europe since World War II. More than 200,000 people died after ethnic warfare erupted among Serbs, Muslims and Croats, the country’s three main ethnic groups. The conflict was the worst of the five civil wars spawned by then-Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic’s attempt to carve a “Greater Serbia” from the six republics of the former Yugoslavia.
U.S. peacekeepers have served in the country since 1995. Moderate political parties won the Bosnian Federation presidency and a majority of the parliament for the first time last fall. Many observers consider the election the most significant advance in years to a lasting peace.
Still, sporadic unrest continues.
In recent months, for example, Bosnian Serbs in several towns have rioted as Muslims tried to rebuild mosques destroyed in the war. About half the Croat troops in the Federation army deserted their posts for about 45 days, after Croat nationalists pulled out of the coalition government.
Arresting war criminals who remain at large would be the quickest step toward weakening the nationalists and ensuring the long-term stability that will enable an American withdrawal, some Bosnian and international officials say.
“If we really want peace and the implementation of the Dayton Peace Agreement, then (Radovan) Karadzic and (Ratko) Mladic must be arrested,” said Mirza Hajric, an adviser to the three-man Bosnian presidency. “The sooner, the better.”
Karadzic is the former president of the Bosnian Serb entity known as the Republic of Srpska, which controls 49 percent of Bosnia. Mladic was his military commander. Both have been charged with genocide and other crimes against humanity.
With Milosevic now awaiting trial in The Hague, Netherlands, expectations are high in Bosnia that Karadzic and Mladic will soon be arrested.
Milosevic fell from power in October. Serbian authorities extradited him this month. He faces charges stemming from the 1998-99 Kosovo conflict, and prosecutors likely will indict him for incidents in Bosnia and Croatia. One hundred people have been charged by The Hague for war crimes in the former Yugoslavia. About 37 remain at large.
But who has responsibility for arresting Karadzic and Mladic?
“SFOR will tell you that they will arrest them if they come across them in the course of their patrols,” said the Western diplomatic source. “This puts the onus on local authorities to make the arrests, but the local authorities, especially in the (Republic of Srpska), have been slow to cooperate. Unofficially, there is a sense that SFOR doesn’t want to take the risk of a confrontation or, heaven forbid, send someone home in a body bag.”
Miller, the outgoing ambassador, dismisses criticism that the United States and its allies are not doing enough to bring the indicted to justice.
The U.S. government has offered a $5 million bounty each for information leading to the arrests of Karadzic and Mladic. The issue remains “an extremely high priority,” Miller said.
“I can’t get into operational details. I can just tell you that there’s a lot of information out there by people who don’t know what they are talking about,” he said. “War criminals are like the weather. Everybody’s got an opinion on them, but no one knows a lot about it.”
Some American military officers, however, address the question more bluntly.
“That’s not our mission,” said Maj. Michael Birmingham, a spokesman for the American military task force at Eagle Base.
Some lower-ranking U.S. troops confirm that they have been warned to steer clear of confrontation.
“In fact,” said one soldier who asked not to be identified, “we’ve been told that even if we see them, do not try to apprehend them.”
Many Bosnians, particularly Muslims, wonder how peace can be achieved as long as war criminals go unpunished.
“How would you feel about returning home if you knew that the person who expelled you or murdered your family was still in power or living next door?” said Emir Suljagic, a journalist with Dani, Bosnia’s largest news magazine.
During the war, Suljagic worked as an interpreter for Dutch peacekeepers at Srebrenica and was guaranteed safe passage as a “protected person” when the Dutch pulled out under U.N. orders before the 1995 massacre there. His younger brother is missing and presumed dead.
During a July 10 visit to Washington, Bosnia’s foreign minister pledged a renewed effort to apprehend Karadzic and Mladic.
Zlato Lagumdzija admitted that Bosnian police had not done enough in the past and vowed that Bosnia “would not become the last country in the region to be the shelter for war criminals.”
But some doubt that Bosnia is strong enough now to go it alone.
“We still need SFOR to help get rid of these guys,” Suljagic said.
Hajric, the Bosnian presidential adviser, compared his country to someone who has suffered a terrible car crash.
“For a long period of time, Bosnia was in bed,” he said. “Right now, Bosnia is on crutches, but basically it’s on its way to a safe recovery. If you take away the crutches, Bosnia will go back to bed. … But don’t give up on Bosnia. Bosnia is a safe bet.”
Copyright 2001 Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
The Macon Telegraph
July 24, 2001, Tuesday
SECTION: A; Pg. 1
LENGTH: 1970 words
HEADLINE: LIFE AT EAGLE BASE: 48TH BRIGADE TRIES TO MAINTAIN NORMALCY AT CAMP
BYLINE: By Drew Brown, Telegraph Staff Writer
DATELINE: EAGLE BASE, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA
BODY:
Twenty-foot chain link fences and rolls of concertina wire separate Georgia peacekeepers from the people they are here to safeguard.
Outside Eagle Base is a land of bombed-out villages and dwellings still pockmarked with bullet holes from the 1992-95 civil war.
Inside is a tidy world of smooth streets and manicured lawns where soldiers must carry guns wherever they go.
This sprawling headquarters for U.S. troops in Bosnia is an oasis of safety in a region recovering from chaos. Life for the 1,200 troops of the Georgia Army National Guard’s 48th Infantry Brigade revolves around one imperative: No one gets hurt. As an American officer put it during a visit last month by reporters: “There is nothing worth an American soldier dying for over here.”
Most U.S. soldiers in Bosnia see little of the country they came to protect, because troop safety is the cardinal rule for senior military officials.
Eagle Base is in many ways like the perfect little American town. There are cappuccino bars, Internet cafes, movie theaters, 24-hour fitness centers, and dining halls serving up all the food you can eat.
“We try to keep a sense of normalcy around here as much as possible,” said Lt. Col. Larry McClendon of Macon, commander of the 148th Logistics Task Force at nearby Camp Comanche.
Most troops rarely leave base camps. For some Georgia soldiers, halfway through a six-month peacekeeping stint, the restrictions are stifling.
“It’s like we’re prisoners here,” said Spc. Latisha Gray, a medic with the Macon-based detachment known as “Charlie Med.”
Gray sat on a bench outside Comanche’s medical clinic on a recent Saturday afternoon. Another medic, Spc. Gery Pollock of Pulaski County, nodded in agreement.
“You can walk up to the gate, look out, put your head down and walk back,” he said.
American soldiers have been in Bosnia as part of the NATO-led Stabilization Force since December 1995, when the Dayton Peace Agreement ended 3 1/2 years of war among Serbs, Muslims and Croats, the country’s primary ethnic groups.
‘Complacency Kills’
While most American soldiers remain sealed off behind barbed wire, troops from other SFOR countries stroll around Sarajevo, Mostar and Tuzla, often unarmed, as if they are tourists on vacation.
By contrast, American troops must carry weapons nearly everywhere, even in camp. The streets of Eagle Base are full of soldiers with M-16 rifles slung across their backs or 9mm pistols in dangling shoulder holsters.
Weapons are supposed to be kept unloaded, except when soldiers venture outside on patrol.
One of the most common sounds at Eagle Base and other camps is the crack of rifle and pistol bolts as soldiers ensure their weapons are empty before entering any building.
Signs at every gun-clearing station warn: PAY ATTENTION! COMPLACENCY KILLS! The last group of American peacekeepers in Bosnia suffered three accidental shootings, one fatal.
Though no American troops have been killed by hostile fire in Bosnia, U.S. military leaders consider the country dangerous. Troop safety, or “force protection” as they call it, remains paramount in senior officers’ minds.
“You’ve got to realize that we’re in a foreign land, and we’re not liked by everyone here,” McClendon said.
McClendon and other officers cite more dangers. One million land mines lie hidden across the country along the former front lines. AK-47 rifles, grenades and other weapons are easy to get.
Before its collapse, Yugoslavia’s defense strategy consisted of arming the populace if an invasion ever occurred. Senior American officers estimate there are 15 automatic rifles left in Bosnia for every one of the 8,500 soldiers in the Muslim-Croat and Bosnian Serb armies.
But American officers describe the former combatants as the “most compliant element” in Bosnia. Rock-throwing crowds are the biggest threat U.S. troops face now, but even those encounters are rare.
“I think the reason we haven’t had any incidents with our soldiers is because everyone knows that Americans are well-armed and are better armed than they are,” said Brig. Gen. Robeley Rigdon, 48th Brigade commander.
Six years after the war, the march to peace in Bosnia has hit several roadblocks. There have been riots in Bosnian Serb areas when Muslims returned to rebuild mosques destroyed in the war. A push for a separate ethnic homeland by Croat nationalists led to a six-week mutiny in the Muslim-Croat army. SFOR troops and auditors attempting to seize bank records in April encountered mob violence in Mostar and other towns.
“Stable, but slow,” is a phrase many Western officials use to describe the progress of peace.
Recent outbreaks of violence remain isolated incidents, they say.
“These are aberrations,” said outgoing U.S. Ambassador Thomas Miller.
“They are, in part, products of the atmosphere of hate. But secondly, they are functions of the hard-line nationalist parties who are losing power.”
Fighting boredom in camp
Keeping the peace can be a boring business, soldiers acknowledge.
“It’s a very set routine we get into here,” said Capt. Kerry Ochs of Warner Robins, who is stationed at Comanche.
“That’s why we try to do things like sports — to keep their minds off home.”
Another officer, who asked not to be identified, was more blunt in his assessment.
“Honestly, a lot of the tasks the soldiers do on a daily basis are just to give them something to do,” he said. “And to take their minds off the fact that they are going to be here awhile.”
Sports injuries keep the medics of Charlie Med hopping. They also have treated three heart attacks, none fatal.
“It’s been a good experience,” said Sgt. David McCarey of Lizella, one of two nurses assigned to the detachment. “We’re doing what we were trained to do.”
Movies are another popular diversion. During last month’s visit, Steven Spielberg’s World War II blockbuster “Saving Private Ryan” was followed by Mel Gibson’s Revolutionary War epic “The Patriot.” The 1970 George C. Scott biopic “Patton” played at The Balkan Grille, one of two dining facilities at Eagle.
Regular Army troops with the 3rd Infantry Division at Camp McGovern, about 15 minutes away by Blackhawk helicopter, watched Tom Berenger’s action flick “Sniper.”
The mess halls at Eagle, McGovern and elsewhere would put most civilian cafeterias back home to shame. Sunday cookouts feature grilled hamburgers, hot dogs, ribs and chicken.
The coolers are stocked with soft-drinks, juice and non-alcoholic beer. There’s even a Burger King and Baskin-Robbins next to the Balkan Grille for soldiers who get tired of Army chow.
Juice and cappuccino bars offer places to unwind in the evenings. At the Internet cafes, troops can surf the Web for free and keep in touch with their loved ones through e-mail and streaming video. Post exchanges at each camp offer a place to spend the extra $110 a month American soldiers earn in Bosnia for hazardous duty pay.
Academic types can earn a few college credits in their spare time. Four universities offer correspondence courses for soldiers in Bosnia.
Those who are interested can study Serbo-Croatian and learn about the country in which they are serving. But few exercise the option. Only eight soldiers at Camp McGovern signed up this semester.
Maybe that’s because the only locals most American soldiers ever talk to are those who work at the camps. Most of them already speak English. About 600 Bosnian civilians work at Eagle Base alone.
The jobs are some of the best in Bosnia. Interpreters make the most money, as much as $1,000 a month, about five times the average salary in Bosnia.
In a sign of how times have changed for the Army, soldiers can take courses in personal development. Topics range from “Speaking Up for Yourself in Today’s Military” to “Effective Coping Through the Buddy System.”
Placards at Eagle’s mess hall warn soldiers how to prevent suicide and recognize the dangers of “combat stress.”
“They try to make it as nice as they can for us,” said Spc. Michael Hutchinson, a medic from Macon. “They try so much to keep up morale. It’s kind of hard when you have limited personnel and someone has to go out and pull guard duty or something.
“But they’re doing the best they can to make us happy.”
Limited contact with residents
Except for those few on patrol, most American soldiers rarely mix with the local population, and then only under supervised conditions.
But senior American officers say they want to give troops a taste of the local culture, and describe occasional shopping trips to Dubrave, a village outside Eagle, or nights out in Tuzla, about 45 minutes away by bus. Excursions to Sarajevo occur about once a month, where soldiers get a chance to tour the city and eat dinner in a restaurant.
Many soldiers say what they find outside the wire is not what they expect.
“They’re very friendly,” said 1st Lt. Jason Smith of Atlanta, describing the local population, which is primarily Muslim.
“I’ve been to Serb and Croat areas where they’re nowhere near as friendly. It’s not that they’re hostile to us, but they don’t go out of their way to be friendly to us either.”
Even so, most troops would love to get outside more often.
“Any guy here will tell you that,” Smith said.
“That’s the one thing we really don’t understand,” McCarey said. “Why we’re still locked down, why we don’t have open gates.”
But some troops find ways to cross cultural barriers.
Sgt. Ken Blackstone of Hawkinsville and Spc. Willie Glover of Augusta spend their days manning a watch tower that overlooks Dubrave.
“Glover here has become sort of a diplomat,” Blackstone said. “He’s gotten quite friendly with this guy who lives over there. The guy will come by, and they’ll just talk for hours.”
Glover said the conversations are about everyday occurrences.
“We’ll basically talk about how his mother is doing,” Glover said. “He tells me everything that is going on in the neighborhood and how peaceful it is, and how thankful he is that the Americans are here.”
And despite the long, idle hours, many soldiers say hearing those sentiments makes all the difference.
“It doesn’t seem like you’re accomplishing much until you look at the bigger picture,” said Spc. John Davis of Milledgeville, as he sat at another isolated post.
“You know, you hear stories about what happened during the war and how bad it was. If me doing this little part helps, then I’ll gladly give up six months of my life to do it.”