For the first time in nearly a month, U.N. relief officials sent two convoys Tuesday in an effort to get aid to needy civilians in central Bosnia.
But despite an agreement last week by the leaders of Bosnia's three warring ethnic factions to stop blocking and shooting at aid trucks, there were no guarantees local military commanders would let the convoys pass.Both convoys were intended for the central Bosnian town of Zenica, the staging area for aid to about 800,000 people. Food stocks in a U.N. warehouse there are nearly exhausted.
"The food is very, very badly needed," said Peter Kessler, a U.N. relief spokesman in Sarajevo.
Frigid, snowy weather has arrived much earlier in Bosnia's second winter of war than last year. In all, an estimated 2.7 million Bosnians are at risk from cold and starvation.
Blockage of U.N. aid has been used as a weapon by all sides in the 19-month-old war, which started when Serbs rebelled over a vote by Bosnia's Muslims and Croats to secede from Yugoslavia.
More than 200,000 people have been killed, and more than 2 million are homeless.
U.N. convoys to central Bosnia were suspended Oct. 26, the day after a Danish driver of an aid truck was shot to death.
Kessler said a 10-truck convoy was heading south from Zagreb, Croatia but still had not received permission from Bosnian Serbs to pass through their territory.
Meanwhile, Serbs in Yugoslavia continued to block convoys trying to cross the border and get to the towns of Srebrenica, Tuzla and Gorazde in eastern Bosnia.