P R E S S   R E L E A S E

For immediate release : 14 August, 1996

The London-based non-governmental organisation which has a team of 16 independent analysts in Bosnia-Herzegovina fears that if elections are rammed through irrespective of conditions, they will turn the Dayton Peace Agreement (DPA) into an ethnic cleansers� charter.

It proposes, instead, a series of measures to help improve conditions in Bosnia-Herzegovina and an alternative timetable in which to enforce them.

Nicholas Hinton, ICG�s President says: "The election campaign is already well under way and it is clear that it is being fought in conditions which are totally unacceptable. There is no way that the elections can be considered to be even remotely free and fair as mandated in the Dayton Agreement.

"The only potential beneficiaries of elections under current conditions will be the nationalist leaders who brought this country to bloodshed in the first place. The consequences will be extremely damaging for Bosnia-Herzegovina and could mark the end of the peace process."

In early June ICG presented a six-month review of the DPA. At the time, the organisation was aware that the conditions for elections were unacceptable, but believed that it was worth setting a deadline and using the intervening months to improve those conditions.

The 14 September deadline, however, has failed to spur the international community to take the kinds of measures, such as the arrest of indicted war criminals, which could help improve conditions. And nationalist leaders on all sides have drawn the obvious conclusions - that the international community is determined to see elections in Bosnia-Herzegovina despite the conditions.

As a result, conditions within Bosnia-Herzegovina have actually been deteriorating as the three ruling parties have set about securing their own re-election.

ICG believes that flagrant abuses of the voter registration process have already brought the elections into disrepute and are sufficient grounds to postpone the elections.

Whereas the architects of the DPA intended elections to contribute to the reintegration of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Bosnian Serb authorities have seized upon a single clause, enabling Bosnians to change the municipality in which they are voting, and abused the distribution of humanitarian aid to cement their war gains and turn the agreement into an ethnic cleansers� charter.

Nicholas Hinton says: "What is most depressing and infuriating about abuses of the voter registration process is that the Bosnian Serb authorities have been able to act with such impunity."

ICG believes that the international community must be fully aware of the consequences of pressing ahead with elections. These consequences, which are fully explained in ICG�s report, include:

• Violence, irregularities and disenfranchised voters on the day
• Loss of what little leverage the international community has over the nationalists
• Re-election of nationalists with no interest in implementing the DPA

The timetable begins from the moment that the most notorious indicted war criminals have been arrested and put on trial in The Hague.

Full details are available with the report which will be distributed at today's press conference, or through the ICG office in London (see contact details below).