Russia Prevents Summit Accord

BUDAPEST, Hungary -- The European security summit in Budapest ended in humiliating disarray Tuesday, with bitter recriminations flying over who was to blame for the continuing war in Bosnia and Russia using its veto to block a joint statement on the conflict.


"We are forced to conclude that the international community is capitulating to the aggressors and accepting the breakup of my country," Bosnian delegate Mahir Hadjiametovic told a tense final session of the two-day Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe meeting. "The people of Bosnia-Herzegovina have been betrayed."


Russian delegate Yury Ushakov told leaders from more than 50 countries that Moscow could not agree to a separate statement on the war in Bosnia, making public use of Russia's veto.


"The Russian delegation notes with regret that despite the persistent effort of many delegations we have not reached agreement on a text which would be acceptable to everyone," Ushakov said.


Referring to a major rift Monday over NATO's proposed expansion, President Boris Yeltsin, in an interview aired on Ostankino television following the close of the summit, expressed disappointment in the session, comparing NATO's relationship with Russia as one of Cold War-style bloc divisions.


"I may have come across as rather extreme," he said. "But the end result is that Russia is the one who takes care of trouble spots in neighboring countries. And that's not fair."


Bosnia's Moslem-led government, bitter at the international community's failure to help it, told delegates that it would not block agreement on wider plans to prevent more Yugoslav-style conflicts in Europe.


But the result was that the summit, called to discuss the future of security in Europe, ended without any official comment on the continent's worst conflict since World War II.


Bosnia had wanted a tough statement on the war, condemning the Serbs for their attacks on Bihac, a Moslem-held enclave in northern Bosnia which has been declared a United Nations safe haven.


Trying to cut through the diplomatic confusion, German Chancellor Helmut Kohl made an impassioned plea to his colleagues to at least agree an appeal for a ceasefire around Bihac.


"Only 300 kilometers from here thousands of people are dying of hunger," he said. "I do not want to go home and answer questions from people who say: 'What did you do on Bihac?'"


The summit did approve plans to send a multinational peacekeeping force to the troubled enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in the former Soviet Union.


It marked the first time the 53-nation Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe had agreed to take on a military mission, although the force's makeup and the date by which it will be sent remain unclear.


The decision to send the multinational force to one of the former Soviet Union's worst trouble spots was included in a final document approved at the end of the summit.


Nagorno-Karabakh has been the scene of bitter fighting between Azerbaijan and Karabakh Armenian forces since 1988.


In a separate development, Russia issued a new appeal to the UN on Tuesday to consider easing sanctions against Yugoslavia as a reward for Belgrade enforcing an embargo on Serbs in Bosnia.


Foreign Ministry spokesman Nikita Matkovsky said the signs were that Belgrade was largely carrying out obligations to seal borders with the Bosnian Serbs. (Reuters, MT)