A Thin Ray of Hope

The wall that Serbian forces had formed around the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo was pierced just enough to let in a ray of hope last week. More than 1,000 Canadian peacekeepers flying the United Nations flag rolled in through the mountains from Croatia to buttress a small U.N. force already in place. The ^ troops and armored vehicles quickly cleared and reopened the airport that had been closed for 87 days by Serbian shelling and sniper fire.

With that, a full-scale international relief effort got under way. Almost 100 tons of emergency supplies from the U.S. arrived in the first two days. Giant cargo planes also flew in from Britain, France, Italy, Norway, Sweden and other countries. The food and medicine were then trucked -- under Canadian guard -- into the desperate city of 400,000 people. In Washington, U.S. Defense Secretary Dick Cheney said American air and naval forces would be available if they are needed to protect the relief flights or future truck convoys.

Relief shipments, welcome as they are, can be only a palliative. They do not end the siege of Sarajevo or the Serbian occupation of about two-thirds of Bosnia-Herzegovina, where Serbs make up less than a third of the population. A political settlement is still out of sight, but Britain's tireless Lord Carrington, the European Community's mediator, returned to Sarajevo last week in a futile attempt to restart the stalled peace talks.

Serbia may be signaling that it is ready to consider a more moderate approach. En route to Belgrade to take up the post of Prime Minister of Yugoslavia was Milan Panic, 62, an American pharmaceutical manufacturer born in Serbia. Panic (pronounced Pahn-ich), summoned by the Yugoslav government to try to improve links with the outside world, had to obtain permission from the U.S. government to break the sanctions barring all contact with Belgrade. Panic said he sees his assignment as an effort to make peace and bring an end to the U.N. sanctions. (See related story on page 60.)