Thousands of Muslims stormed a U.N. relief convoy when it arrived in Srebrenica and fought fiercely for places on the trucks that would take them out of the besieged enclave.
About 2,000 refugees reached the relative safety of Tuzla after a four-hour journey Thursday, but only after being stoned by Serbs as they passed through Zvornik in open trucks. There were unconfirmed reports of deaths.U.N. officials postponed another Sre-bre-nica convoy until Saturday to give aid officials in Tuzla time to process the refugees. They said Serbs had blocked aid from reaching Gorazde, another besieged Muslim enclave in eastern Bosnia, for the second straight day.
Aid officials also warned that their stocks of food and medicine were running low and appealed for more donations from the international community.
Gen. Philippe Morillon, commander of U.N. peacekeepers in Bosnia, met Friday in Yugoslavia with Ratko Mladic, commander of the Bosnian Serb militia, the Yugoslav news agency Tanjug said. It said Morillon and other U.N. officials were trying to negotiate for peacekeepers to be stationed in Srebrenica, the scene of some of the bloodiest fighting in the year-old war.On Thursday, about 300 Serbs ringed Morillon's armored car in Zvornik to prevent him from entering Srebrenica with about 150 Canadian peacekeepers.
Cmdr. Barry Frewer, a peacekeeper spokesman, said combat raged outside Srebrnica on Thursday and the Serbs cut the town's water supply. He said the fighting died down Friday.
"We all desperately want to go. It was very crowded," said Magula Vrajkovina, 55, who made it on one of the trucks leaving Srebrenica. "Everyone was beating each other."
Vrajkovina said she saw a soldier throw one woman off a truck, killing her. She also said two babies suffocated, but officials traveling with the convoy could not confirm any deaths. At least nine people died during evacuations last week.
Panic in Srebrenica
Pierre Ollier, a U.N. aid official traveling with the convoy, said people rushed to board the trucks before the food and medicine could even be fully unloaded.
"We were unable to unload the last trucks, they just threw off the aid," he said. "The population is so desperate, they just rushed. There was a huge panic. It was very violent."
In Sarajevo, where sniper fire was intense Friday, Sen. Joseph Biden, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, urged the lifting of the U.N. embargo on selling arms to Bosnia's Muslim-led government.
Wearing a green camouflage flak jacket, Biden, D-Del., said the United States was prepared to send $50 million in military aid immediately if the U.N. Security Council ended the embargo. But the council has not shown any inclination to do so.
Ammunition found in flour
The United Nations suffered a serious embarrassment outside Sarajevo on Thursday when Serbs found 48 boxes of ammunition hidden in a supply of flour being taken to a Muslim suburb.
U.N. officials had strongly denied Serb claims that their aid convoys were used to smuggle arms and ammunition to the outgunned Bosnian government and expressed outrage at meticulous searches at Serb checkpoints.
U.N. spokesman John McMillan said an investigation was under way.
Bosnian Serbs filed a protest Friday with U.N. peacekeepers, U.N. aid officials and the Red Cross. The Serbs threatened to impound future relief convoys and arrest their crews if more arms are discovered, according to a copy of the protest note obtained by The Associated Press.
U.N. pressuring Serbs
The U.N. Security Council, meanwhile, is trying to increase pressure on Bosnian Serbs to sign an international peace accord. Bosnian Muslims and Croats have already signed.
In New York, the council put the finishing touches on a resolution to tighten trade restrictions on Yugoslavia by cracking down on smuggling and freezing Yugoslav financial assets in other nations. The council's president said he was aiming for adoption of the resolution Monday.
The council hopes Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic and his government will pressure their Bosnian Serb allies to sign an international peace accord.
NATO said it would start enforcing a no-fly zone over Bosnia on Monday.