Shelling Keeps Electric Power Off in Sarajevo

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina — Shelling frustrated U.N. soldiers’ attempts Thursday to restore electrical power that was knocked out three days earlier to 80% of the Bosnian capital.

Shelling began Wednesday morning as a team of engineers left U.N. Protection Force headquarters in an armored car for the damaged power station north of the city at Ugorsko. They made no progress on repairs.

Sarajevo has suffered from irregular electricity and water supplies for much of the nearly six-month-long siege by Serbian forces. Only about 20% of the city’s dwindling population of 350,000 has had power since shells slammed into the Ugorsko power station Monday night.

The warring parties--Muslims, Serbs and Croats--signed an agreement last weekend in Geneva not to disrupt basic utility supplies.

Bosnian state radio said Thursday that water supply lines near Stup, a western suburb that has seen heavy fighting, were being repaired. Water should be running again soon in all newer parts of Sarajevo and in about 40% of houses in the old town, it said.

In neighboring Croatia, the United Nations’ chief civilian officer warned Croatian officials not to begin returning refugees to the easternmost of four U.N. protection zones, saying that Serbian militias are still menacing civilians.

Cyrus R. Vance of the United Nations and Lord Owen of the European Community, heading a Yugoslav peace conference in Geneva, said they will fly to Banja Luka on Friday to investigate similar reports of intimidation around a Serbian stronghold in northern Bosnia.

Serbian fighters who want to remain tied to Serbia and Montenegro, which together form the rump state of Yugoslavia, have captured two-thirds of Bosnia. Several thousand people have been killed since Bosnia’s Muslims and Croats voted Feb. 29 for independence from Yugoslavia.