LETTER:Does the West really want the Muslims driven out of Europe?

From Mr Dragomir Sabanovic

Sir: It should be recognised that Srebrenica, Zepa and Gorazde have for a long time been safe areas for Muslim terrorists behind the Serbian front lines. The Bosnian Serb authorities were therefore acting in conformity with the needs of international peace in suppressing the Srebrenica pocket and peacefully expelling the terrorists.

The British troops in Gorazde should hand over their arms forthwith to the Bosnian Serb forces and accept the presence of Serbian liaison officers with their formations, and co-operate with the Serbian liaison officers in singling out terrorists of whatever sex and age from the alleged civilian population for interrogation by the Serb forces.

This would constitute a welcome resumption of the intelligence co-operation such as existed between our forces at Bleiburg in Austria in 1945.

It would also be in the tradition of the glorious advance of Serb, Greek, French and British forces from Salonika under a Serbian general to confront the remnants of Austro-German and Hungarian imperialism with the terms of the Belgrade armistice in 1918.

Britain needs today a strong counterweight to the growing Austro-German combination in Europe. It follows that Britain needs a strong Serbia with wide outlets to the Adriatic, besides those of the Montenegrin coast. Such a Serbia exists today in embryo, having a strong centralised government resisting the Trojan horse of Hungarian and Swabian revanchism in Vojvodina - again a British interest.

Such a Serbia can be achieved by lifting the ineffective embargo on Serbia, thus strengthening the hand of President Milosevic, maintaining the embargo on Bosnia and restricting the British military contribution to the UN to escorting humanitarian aid with Serbian supervision.

Yours truly,

Dragomir Sabanovic

Canewdon,

Essex

16 July