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yugoslavias implosion

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174<br />

ChApter 2<br />

In that way the un peace force would establish a buffer zone<br />

and separate the parties to the conflict until the Yugoslav crisis is<br />

resolved, with the engagement of the United Nations, in a peaceful<br />

and just manner based on international law. That would create the<br />

necessary conditions for the Presidency of the sfry, as the supreme<br />

commander of the armed forces of the sfry, to decide to disengage<br />

the ypa in the prevention of interethnic conflicts on the territory of<br />

the Republic of Croatia. 271<br />

The un secretary-general responded by sending a special envoy,<br />

Cyrus Vance, to Belgrade to negotiate the possibility of sending international<br />

troops to Croatia. On November 27, the Security Council<br />

adopted Resolution 721 regarding deployment of the un peacekeeping<br />

operation in Croatia. Under the terms of an agreement known as the<br />

Vance Plan and reached on January 2, 1992, the un Security Council<br />

sent 14,000 peacekeeping troops to Croatia.<br />

With the entry of international troops into Croatia on February<br />

21, 1992, the ypa and the Serbian leadership realized their objective of<br />

establishing the rsk and placing it under ypa protection.<br />

Not only in Croatia but in other parts of Yugoslavia, too, the ypa<br />

was in a process of withdrawal, clearly exposing the fiction that the<br />

ypa represented and served all the republics of the federation.<br />

In December 1991, the Serbian leadership decided on a “timely”<br />

ypa withdrawal from Bosnia-Herzegovina—that is, the evacuation<br />

of military personnel who were not from that republic, so as to provide<br />

political and legal cover for claims that was “Serbia not at war<br />

in Bosnia.”<br />

Anticipating international recognition of Bosnia-Herzegovina,<br />

Milošević believed that such a move would prevent “total military<br />

chaos by having to move the army about from one part of the<br />

country to another.” Kadijević, who was told that a withdrawal was<br />

“strategically and politically essential,” although not in conformity<br />

271 Borisav Jović, Poslednji dani SFRJ, p . 410

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