Leading Article: Ceasefire: handle with caution

WHEN Bosnian Serb leaders suggest talks for a ceasefire, it is well to ask why they are doing so. The answer in the present instance is clear. They believe that to freeze the existing situation, or something like it, with the UN's blessing would be to their advantage. They realise that time is no longer on their side. They have serious manpower problems. Their Muslim opponents have far more troops, if fewer heavy weapons. Their own morale is low, that of the Muslims much higher.

The old alliance between the Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats has been revived, with agreement to share control of those parts of Bosnia not held by the Bosnian Serbs. The latter's biggest fear is of a joint military offensive to drive them from territory they now hold. Worst of all, such an assault could sever the corridor in the north joining the two halves of Serb-held land.

In this situation, a ceasefire makes perfect sense. A similar tactic worked wonderfully for the Serbs in Krajina, the Croatian region with a large Serb population. Having won military control, they agreed to a ceasefire monitored by UN troops. They then continued their ethnic cleansing of local Croat and Hungarian-speaking minorities under the noses of UN troops.

The idea of a ceasefire throughout Bosnia is naturally very appealing. Serb pressure on Gorazde was no doubt intended to increase pressure for such a move. Who, after all, could not want to bring the sufferings of the people of that embattled enclave to a swift conclusion? Nevertheless, given all the above considerations, it is hardly surprising that Muslim leaders remain sceptical of Serb intentions.

General Sir Michael Rose and the UN should agree to nothing that would deprive the Muslims of the 20-odd per cent of Serb-held territory to which last year's UN- European Union peace plan suggested they were entitled. If a ceasefire is agreed, it should be accompanied not just by the withdrawal of heavy Bosnian Serb guns, but also by a clear understanding that the Serbs would be expected to withdraw from a specific percentage of territory: a 20 per cent reduction would still leave them with roughly 50 per cent.

The most intractable problems would then be to agree precisely where lines should be drawn, and how to deal with the small enclaves of Muslims that would remain within Serbian lines. Given the West's encouragement of the Muslim-Croat agreement to form a federation linked to Croatia, it is hard to see how the UN can deny the Bosnian Serbs the right to a comparable link with Serbia proper.