EU ministers pursue plan to carve up Bosnia

Brussels (Reuter) - European Union foreign ministers meet today following an agreement by the world's big powers to launch new peace negotiations in Bosnia.

The meeting will be the first opportunity for all 12 EU countries to obtain details of Friday's ministerial accord in Geneva, where Russia, the United States and five EU nations agreed on a joint strategy for pursuing peace in Bosnia.

Ministers at the Geneva meeting - at which the EU was represented by Germany, France, Britain, Belgium and Greece - instructed a group of senior US, Russian and EU officials to get Bosnian negotiations moving 'within the next two weeks'.

They endorsed a plan to give 49 per cent of Bosnia-Herzegovina to the Bosnian Serbs and the rest to a Muslim-Croat federation.

It was the first joint peace initiative between the three powers concerning the war in former Yugoslavia and was the kind of joint accord envisioned by EU ministers in Luxembourg last month, when they called for more co-ordination of Bosnia strategy by outside powers.

Today, the ministers are expected to agree financing for the EU's administration of the Bosnian town of Mostar. About pounds 24.5m is to be allocated.

Mostar's administration is one of the first foreign policy actions taken by the Union as a whole rather than as individual states. Such common actions were called for under the Maastricht treaty on European Union, which became effective last year.

The ministers are expected to agree on a pact with Moscow that offers the possibility of an EU-Russia free-trade accord. The EU Trade Commissioner, Sir Leon Brittan, will report on an agreement in principle reached with Russia's Deputy Prime Minister, Alexander Shokhin.

It aims at improving links in areas such as trade in goods, rules for companies, cross-border supply services and rules governing payments and capital.

It would also recognise Russia as having 'an economy in transition', a step in the country's preparation for eventual membership of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and allow for negotiations on a free-trade accord in 1998.

SARAJEVO - Fighting raged yesterday between the mainly Muslim Bosnian army and Bosnian Serb troops near the northern Bosnian town of Tuzla, the UN Protection Force (Unprofor) said in a statement, AFP reports. The heaviest clashes were centred on the region of Brgule, south of Tuzla.

Unprofor also confirmed earlier reports that the Bosnian army was gaining ground and had captured about 10 square kilometres (4 square miles) of territory in the Vijenac region. The rest of Bosnia was said to be relatively calm.