 |
|
Britain starts EU drawdown in Bosnia
More than 500 troops are pulling out this week. But much work remains.
By Beth Kampschror | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the March 16, 2007 edition
Page 1 of 2
BANJA LUKA, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA - Over the din of a forklift trundling past and drilling echoing off the concrete floor of this cavernous metal factory turned military base, a dozen Welsh Guards are loading boxes onto a truck, destined for Britain.
It's closing time here at the Metal Factory Base in northern Bosnia. Up until several months ago, it was one of three such large bases in Bosnia, a country about the size of West Virginia. Over the course of the next week, Britain's Welsh Guards are pulling out as part of the European Union's peacekeeping reductions in Bosnia, a dozen years after the 1992-1995 war ended.
The rationale for the drawdown, says Maj. Ali Spry, the Guards' intelligence officer, is that the remaining work to be done in Bosnia – whether it's finding illegal weapons or helping hunt down PIFWCs (military-speak for Persons Indicted For War Crimes) – now requires a good local police force, rather than the brute force of the military.
"For going after the PIFWC support network, you need financial experts and bank experts – you don't need 300 hairy Welshmen kicking in doors," he says.
The European Union (EU), which took over peacekeeping here from NATO in 2004, decided last month to reduce its troop presence from around 6,000 to 2,500. Britain is pulling out 530 total, 350 of whom are from the Welsh Guards. Germany has announced it will follow Britain's lead, withdrawing its troops from Bosnia as well. In addition, the last US soldiers stationed here left this past winter.
The civilian side of post-war reconstruction, however, is far from finished. While the eventual goal may be membership in the 27-nation EU, reforming the country's fractured police forces and changing the country's constitution must come first.
These sensitive reforms strike at the heart of the debate over what type of country Bosnia should be – the very reason war broke out here in 1992.
And the discussion coincides with the prospect that the nearby UN-run province of Kosovo may receive some type of independence from Serbia.
As that possibility began looking more likely with the release of UN envoy Martti Ahtisaari's recommendations last month, the international community decided several weeks ago to keep the doors open on Bosnia's head civilian office, the Office of the High Representative (OHR), until June 2008.
RSS feed
