U.S. Department of State 96/01/17 Daily Press Briefing

From: hristu@arcadia.harvard.edu (Dimitrios Hristu)

U.S. State Department Directory

Subject: U.S. Department of State 96/01/17 Daily Press Briefing

Office of the Spokesman

[...]

Bosnian Contact Group Meeting .............................1

Amb Holbrooke's Meetings and Balkan Schedule ..............1-2

Amb Holbrooke's Resignation ...............................17

[...]

FORMER YUGOSLAVIA

Concentration Camps in Serbia .............................6-7

Camp Detainees (Refugees) Included in Bosnian Govt's

Request for Info from the Serbs and Bosnian Serbs .........7-8,10-11

Treatment and Release of Refugees in Camps ................9-10

U.S. Arrival of Refugees ..................................10

Organizations Coordinating Placement ......................10

Status of Compliance with Dayton Accord Guidelines ........8-9

[...]

CYPRUS

Holbrooke Mtgs with Greek-Americans & Turkish Americans ...16-17

Holbrooke Travel to Cyprus ................................17

TURKEY

Hostage Taking by Chechen Rebels in Trabzon. ..............17,19

[...]

[...]

Third, there will be a Contact Group meeting tomorrow in Sarajevo with Carl Bildt. The United States will be represented by Ambassador Dick Holbrooke who will be leaving Washington for Sarajevo this evening. This meeting has been organized by the United States and our Contact Group partners to assess the degree of compliance by the Serbs, Bosnian Serbs, by the Bosnian Government and the Croatians to the Dayton Accords.

During his stay in Sarajevo, Ambassador Holbrooke will have this meeting with Carl Bildt. He'll have a separate meeting with Admiral Leighton Smith, the Commander of NATO forces in Sarajevo. He will also be meeting -- Ambassador Holbrooke -- with the Bosnian Government.

Ambassador Holbrooke will be accompanied by Assistant Secretary of State John Shattuck, who will be working on the prisoner exchange issue, which we hope to have settled by this Friday, and other human rights concerns that are obvious, I think, to all of you and important to the United States.

Following these meetings in Sarajevo, Ambassador Holbrooke will be traveling to Belgrade at the instruction of Secretary Christopher for conversations with President Milosevic. From there, he will go on to Germany for discussions with German Government officials.

[...]

Q There's an article in the British newspaper, The Guardian, this morning that talks about several concentration-like camps that are located in Serbia. Are you all aware of these camps? Are these people going to be included in the prisoner exchanges that are supposed to be completed by Friday?

MR. BURNS: Yes. We've seen the article, Betsy, and we have looked into this matter. I understand the following.

After the fall of Srebrenica and Zepa, when 60,000 people were driven out of Srebrenica and roughly 20,000 - 25,000 people out of Zepa, approximately 790-odd people -- it could be closer to 800 -- fled to Serbia. These are Bosnian Muslims, most of whom I believe were soldiers, who fled to Serbia. They were incarcerated there, interned there. They have been interned there in several camps since August in appalling conditions.

The people who have left, who are now refugees in European countries from these camps, report widespread beatings, report that they were malnourished and underfed and that they were victims of abuse.

We have supported since August, when we discovered the whereabouts of these camps, the efforts of the International Committee of the Red Cross, which is the lead international organization for these types of matters. We've supported the ICRC in their quest to identify these people, to press the Serbian Government to allow these people to leave. I understand that most of them elected not to return to Bosnia for whatever reason. But they wanted to seek refuge as refugees overseas in countries beyond Bosnia and Serbia.

The United States has agreed to take 214 of the 790 people as refugees into the United States. In fact, 50 of that group are arriving in the United States today. One hundred and three of these people have been taken in by the Australian Government as refugees; 70 by the French Government. The Irish Government has agreed to take a number of these refugees as well. Other countries are being asked.

The effort here is to empty these camps, relieve these people of the appalling conditions under which they're being held and to allow them to travel safely to third countries as refugees.

It's a tragedy that these people were caught up not only in the attack and the slaughter around Srebrenica and Zepa but in the conditions in which they've had to live for the last five months.

Q So these are not people that are included in the Bosnian Muslim request for identification of people that the Bosnian Serbs or the Serbs may be holding?

MR. BURNS: I can't answer that question. I think that's really a question for the Bosnian Government.

On that issue, though, let me say, we certainly support the Bosnian Government in its quest for detailed information from the Bosnian Serbs and, if it's appropriate and applicable and relevant, from the Serbian Government about missing people.

Betsy, the reason I can't answer more about it, I just don't know what the universe of names is that the Bosnian Government is seeking from the Bosnian Serbs and the Serbs; whether or not these people are included is a question for them.

We support the Bosnian Government. We think that the Serbs owe them an answer about the missing people from Srebrenica and Zepa and from other atrocities that occurred at the hands of the Bosnian Serbs.

At the same time, we think it is absolutely critical that the deadlines be met, the deadlines established under the Dayton Accords. Because if we in the international community allow deadlines to lapse for whatever reason, then this Dayton Accord is not going to hold together. So we have made that abundantly clear to the Bosnian Government as well as to the Bosnian Serb Government.

One of the reasons that Assistant Secretary Shattuck is going out to Sarajevo tonight is to work on this problem with both the Bosnian Government and Bosnian Serb Government.

When we're on the subject of deadlines, I think it's useful to talk about what has to happen by the end of this week. As you remember, the Dayton Accord established very specific guidelines, and specifically those that pertain to IFOR responsibility and refer to commitments by the negotiating parties.

On Friday, January 19, of course, that is the date that is 30 days from the transfer of authority from the United Nations to IFOR. It is the deadline for compliance for the following elements of the Dayton Accords: that all armed civilian groups, except authorized police, should be disarmed and disbanded; that there be complete withdrawal of forces to behind the zone of separation, including in Sarajevo; that the parties remove all hazards from the zones of separations in areas of withdrawal and that they mark all hazards that remain such as mines throughout Bosnia, and that they attempt to remove these hazards subsequently as directed by the IFOR commander.

On January 19, IFOR assumes the right to provide military security within the areas that are to be transferred. Additionally, on January 19, the parties provide the Joint Military Commission with a report on the status of their military forces.

Also, as you know -- and this has been in the news lately -- the parties agree to complete the release and transfer of prisoners. We want that to happen by Friday. We're going to work very closely with the parties to make that happen. We think the Bosnian Serbs ought to give some information to the Bosnian Government about just exactly who is missing.

The IFOR commander is currently assessing compliance with the Dayton agreement's provision on withdrawal of foreign forces. When that assessment is complete, I assume that the IFOR commander will speak publicly and issue a report on that. So Friday is an important day. A lot of things have to happen by Friday.

One of the reasons that the United States proposed a Contact Group meeting with Carl Bildt and one of the reasons why Holbrooke and Shattuck will be talking with the Bosnian Government is to try to assess compliance in the day leading up to Friday.

Q What is the exact deadline? Is it Friday midnight, Washington-time, Paris-time? What's the --

MR. BURNS: Good question. I assume it's one second past midnight, or one minute past midnight, but I don't know for sure. I can check that for you.

Q Nick, what can you report with regard to the IFOR -- especially in the American sector -- going into the zones of separation, staking out the boundaries, seeing what kind of compliance there has been and what may yet need to be? What does it look like?

MR. BURNS: I think, Bill, I should leave that up to General Nash and others in his command. They're the people who have authority on the ground. They have reported, as you know, that things are going well; that we have more than 12,000 American troops in our sector; that the other countries have their troops in place, and that IFOR is well set up, well established to assume responsibility and now to take the actions that it must as of January 19.

Q Do you have any problem with President Milosevic's treatment of these refugees? How long have you known about it?

MR. BURNS: We've been aware of the fact that these people -- refugees -- have been held in this camp for many months. We've pressed the Serbian Government to release them as refugees, and we've worked with the ICRC -- the International Committee of the Red Cross -- to try to improve their conditions and to find places for them to relocate.

We certainly had very serious conversations with the Serbian Government about their welfare and their status.

Q Was this included in discussions around the settlement of the Dayton Accords?

MR. BURNS: This issue has been discussed internationally, including by the United States all the way back to August. So it was part of Dick Holbrooke's shuttle missions. It certainly did come up at Dayton, yes -- all these issues did.

Q Milosevic has just now agreed to release them?

MR. BURNS: I think that the process of releasing these people and getting them to third countries has been underway for a little bit of time. I don't know when the first person got out. But it's been underway at least for several weeks. It's a good thing that these people are being released. Because, again, they were held under brutal and appalling conditions.

Q I'm just curious. Where are they arriving in the United States, and what organization is coordinating their placement?

MR. BURNS: I don't have the information about what port they're arriving at, but I can check that, Laura, and see if we can help you with it.

Yes, Howard.

Q The information that the you would like the Bosnian Serbs to turn over to the Bosnian Government, what sort of information do you expect that they have? Do you think they have lists of names?

MR. BURNS: The Bosnian Government has asked for something which is quite reasonable. That is, they've asked the Bosnian Serbs to provide them with the names of people who are missing.

We know what happened in several of these instances where cities were overrun by the Bosnian Serb military. We strongly suspect that there were horrible massacres of men and boys near the Potocari football stadium just in the day or two after the fall of Srebrenica.

If the Bosnian Serbs have information pertaining to who those people were, what might have happened to them, if there are people still being held and the identity of these people is not known to the Bosnian Government, the Bosnian Serbs ought to take the opportunity soon to tell the Bosnian Government who these people are and where they're being held.

Q Do you have any reason to think that they do have lists, that they took the time to compile lists of people?

MR. BURNS: I have no independent knowledge of that. But I think this is a reasonable request and it ought to be answered.

I also think -- and I want to be clear about saying this -- that while we support the wish of the Bosnian Government to get this information, we want to see these prisoner swaps take place by Friday, January 19. We cannot be in a position of granting extensions to deadlines as we seek to implement the Dayton Accords.

The Bosnian Serbs have asked for an extension on matters pertaining to Bosnian Government control of Sarajevo. I think you've heard American officials say that we don't anticipate that there will be extensions in that regard.

I think that the Bosnian Government has to expect that we can't extend deadlines either on this side. But the Bosnian Serbs ought to be reasonable and they ought to try to slowly establish the patterns of cooperation that they have to, to live next door to the Bosnian Government in the foreseeable future.

[...]

Q I raise the question to Mr. Andreas Papandreou's step-down, not his resignation. So that's why I missed your statement.

Do you have any comment on yesterday's separate meeting on Cyprus between Ambassador Richard Holbrooke and members of the Greek and Turkish leadership of America?

MR. BURNS: I spoke a little briefly just before coming out here with Ambassador Holbrooke. He told me that he had a very fine meeting yesterday with a large group of leaders in the United States, some who are Greek-Americans, some who are Turkish-Americans and others.

With respect to the topics covered in the meeting, I can tell you that they talked about the general situation in Southeast Europe -- United States relationship with Greece and Turkey. Our hope that at some point in the near future -- we hope that will be February -- the United States might help the parties in the Cyprus conflict to renew negotiations and to push those negotiations forward.

Q Do you know if Mr. Holbrooke will go to Cyprus in the first days of February as he promised he --

MR. BURNS: I wouldn't anticipate it would be the first days of February. That's just 10 days away or so. I wouldn't anticipate it because we still need to -- obviously, the Greek Government needs to select a new Prime Minister. The Turkish Government needs to have a new government formed, and we need to await the decisions on both governments and the formation of governments before Ambassador Holbrooke can undertake his voyage.

Q He's leaving the Department of State on February 20, as I understand.

MR. BURNS: He's actually submitted a letter of resignation that would have him leave around February 21. He'll be going on to private life. He hasn't made a decision about exactly what he'll be doing in private life. He, of course, will be available to the Secretary for guidance and counsel even after he leaves.

Q Do you have any comment on the new turn of events in Dagestan, in Turkey?

MR. BURNS: What I would say, we've been watching, as you have, the tragic events in Pervomayskoye -- the tragic events which have left so many people dead.

[...]

(The briefing concluded at 1:59 p.m.)

END