(14 Dec 1995) Serbo-Croat/English
With the signing of the Dayton accord, Bosnia will be divided into two republics, Serb and Muslim-Croat.
A vicious Muslim-Croat war ended following U-S mediation in 1994.
Now the Muslims and Croats must live together in the Bosnia Croat Federation.
Gornji Vakuf, in central Bosnia, is one town that is split between Muslims and Croats and the population is also divided on whether the Dayton peace accord will work.
On a cold morning in Gornji Vakuf, these Croat youngsters turn up for soccer practice in what is left of their gym.
The soccer club is run by the camp commander at the British Barracks in the town.
With the help of a translator he coaches his team on the basics of playing the game.
But he has greater ambitions beyond success on the soccer field. He would like the boys to play alongside Muslims in a joint team.
But he says it will be a long time before they are ready to forget the reasons for the war between their two peoples.
SOUNDBITE: (English)
The aim of the exercise is, in actual fact, not to get them to play each other but to play together perhaps against another town.
Question: Are they willing to do that?
Answer: I think in the fullness of time but it's going to take a fair amount of time.
SUPERCAPTION: Major Butch Maycock, British Army
The signs of the recent war are everywhere in Gornji Vakuf.
It is still very much a town divided, the Muslim community lives on the left of the main street and the Croats on the right.
The Post Office was the headquarters of the Croat forces.
A hotel housed the Muslims, they literally fought each other across the main street.
Every building in town bears the scars of war.
There is nothing left of the former local government building.
But the divisions cut through the community at every level, even before the war.
Of the 25-thousand who lived here before the war, the population was roughly split in half with ten thousand Croats, and 15-thousand Muslims.
But the Muslims owned 70 percent of the land.
The children go to either Muslim or Croat schools, the people worship at either the church or the mosque and there are very few intermarriages.
But the conflict has united them in one way, every one has lost a loved one in the fighting.
More than one thousand people were killed and every day widows visit the graveyards to mourn the dead.
This Croat cemetery is no exception.
Under the Dayton peace accord, Muslims and Croats will have to live together under the new federation. But the signs are not good.
Before the war the local government was run by both Muslims and Croats but now there are two mayors - one for each group.
The Croat mayor met British Brigadier Richard Dannett to discuss the problems the town faces.
He says his people believe the Dayton agreement has been imposed on them against their will.
SOUNDBITE: (Serbo-Croat)
They are not happy with the Dayton Agreement. They look at it as something imposed on them by higher and stronger factions in the world today. They don't think it is a just peace.
SUPER CAPTION: Zdradko Batinic, Croat Mayor
This bar in the Muslim part of Gornji Vakuf took a direct hit during the war.
Owner Seketa Sahrudin lost three family members in the conflict.
Two of his brothers and his sister were killed but he is not bitter.
He says the community must learn to live together again.
SOUNDBITE: (Serbo-Croat)
It will be hard, but there is no other option. We have to live on, and everything that has happened has to be forgotten for the sake of a better tomorrow.
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