Brioni Agreement

Brioni Agreement

Map of Slovenia (green), Croatia (pink) and the remainder of Yugoslavia (pale yellow) at the time of the Brioni Agreement
Drafted	5 July 1991
Signed	7 July 1991
Location	Brijuni, Croatia
Mediators	Hans van den Broek, João de Deus Pinheiro, Jacques Poos
Signatories	Milan Kučan, Franjo Tuđman, Ante Marković, Budimir Lončar, Petar Gračanin, Stane Brovet, Bogić Bogićević, Janez Drnovšek, Branko Kostić, Stjepan Mesić and Vasil Tupurkovski
Parties	Croatia  Slovenia  Yugoslavia
hr:Brijunska deklaracija at Wikisource

The Brioni Agreement or Brioni Declaration (Croatian: Brijunska deklaracija, Serbian: Brionska deklaracija, Slovene: Brijonska deklaracija) is a document signed by representatives of Slovenia, Croatia and the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia under the political sponsorship of the European Community (EC) on the Brijuni Islands on 7 July 1991. The agreement sought to create an environment in which further negotiations on the future of Yugoslavia could take place. However, ultimately it isolated the federal prime minister Ante Marković in his efforts to preserve Yugoslavia, and effectively stopped any form of federal influence over Slovenia. This meant the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) would focus on combat in Croatia, creating a precedent of redrawing international borders and staking the EC's interest in resolving the Yugoslav crisis.

The agreement put an end to hostilities between the JNA and Slovene forces in the Ten-Day War. Slovenia and Croatia agreed to suspend activities stemming from their 25 June declarations of independence for a period of three months. The document also resolved border control and customs inspection issues regarding Slovenia's borders, resolved air-traffic control responsibility and mandated an exchange of prisoners of war. The Brioni Agreement also formed the basis for an observer mission to monitor implementation of the agreement in Slovenia. Eleven days after the agreement was made, the federal government pulled the JNA out of Slovenia. Conversely, the agreement made no mitigating impact on fighting in Croatia.

Background

On 23 June 1991, as Slovenia and Croatia prepared to declare their independence during the breakup of Yugoslavia, the European Community (EC) foreign ministers decided the EC member states would not extend diplomatic recognition to the two states. The EC viewed the declarations as unilateral moves and offered assistance in negotiations regarding the future of the SFR Yugoslavia instead. At the same time, the EC decided to suspend direct talks with Slovenia and Croatia. The move was welcomed by the Yugoslav federal government.^[1] Slovenia and Croatia declared independence on 25 June,^[2] and the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) units began to deploy from its bases in Slovenia the next day. On 27 June, armed conflict broke out as the JNA and the Territorial Defence Force of Slovenia (TDS) began fighting over control of Slovenia's border posts, in what became the Ten-Day War.^[3]

A three-strong EC delegation made three visits to the region in late June and early July to negotiate a political agreement which would facilitate further negotiations. The delegation consisted of the foreign ministers of Luxembourg, as the incumbent holder of the EC presidency, and Italy and the Netherlands, as the previous and future holders of that office.^[1] The delegation members were Jacques Poos (Luxembourg), Gianni de Michelis (Italy), and Hans van den Broek (Netherlands). Prior to the delegation's arrival in Belgrade, Poos told reporters that the EC would take charge of the crisis. There, the delegation was met by Serbian president Slobodan Milošević who dismissed the prospect of Croatia leaving the Yugoslav federation because its population contained 600,000 Serbs.^[2]

On 29 June, Croatia and Slovenia agreed to suspend their declarations of independence to allow time for a negotiated settlement. The EC delegation appeared to make progress when Serbia responded to the move by ceasing their opposition to the appointment of a Croatian member of the federal presidency, Stjepan Mesić, as the body's chairman on 30 June. The appearance of a success was reinforced when the JNA ordered its troops posted in Slovenia to return to their barracks.^[2] On 1 July, de Michelis was replaced by João de Deus Pinheiro, the Portuguese foreign minister, to maintain the formula of current, former and future EC presidencies comprising the EC delegation as the Netherlands took over the presidency from Luxembourg, while Portugal was scheduled to assume the presidency after the Dutch.^[4]

Conference at Brijuni

Hans van den Broek headed the EC delegation

A further result of the EC delegation's mission were talks attended by representatives of the EC, Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia and the Yugoslav government. The talks were held at Brijuni Islands on 7 July.^[2] Besides the EC delegation, headed by van den Broek,^[5] five out of eight members of the federal presidency attended the talks—Mesić, Bogić Bogićević, Janez Drnovšek, Branko Kostić and Vasil Tupurkovski. The Yugoslav federal prime minister Ante Marković was also present, as were the Yugoslav federal foreign minister Budimir Lončar, interior minister Petar Gračanin and the deputy defence minister Vice Admiral Stane Brovet.^[6] Croatia was represented by President Franjo Tuđman while President Milan Kučan attended on behalf of Slovenia. Serbia was represented by Borisav Jović, a former Serbian member of the federal presidency who had resigned from the position on 15 June, instead of Milošević who refused to attend.^[7] Starting at 8 am, the EC delegation held separate talks with Kučan and his assistants, then with Tuđman and his assistants, and finally with Jović. In the afternoon, a plenary meeting was held with the federal, Slovene and Croatian delegations in attendance, while Jović reportedly left dissatisfied with the talks.^[8]

The agreement was prepared at the EC council of ministers in The Hague on 5 July.^[9] It consisted of a Joint Declaration, and two annexes detailing the creation of an environment suitable to further political negotiations and guidelines for an observer mission to Yugoslavia.^[10] The agreement, which became known as the Brioni Declaration or the Brioni Agreement,^[11] required the JNA and the TDS to return to their bases, and stipulated that Slovene officials were to control Slovenia's borders alone and that both Slovenia and Croatia were to suspend all activities stemming from their declarations of independence for three months.^[12] The observer mission set out by the Brioni Agreement materialised as the European Community Monitor Mission (ECMM) tasked with monitoring the disengagement of the JNA and the TDS in Slovenia,^[11] and ultimately the withdrawal of the JNA from Slovenia.^[13]

Aftermath

Even though little was agreed upon and the agreement was later interpreted differently by its signatories, the Brioni Agreement established the EC's interest in the region and the first EC Ministerial Conference on Yugoslavia was held in The Hague on 10 July.^[13] The ECMM helped calm several standoffs around military barracks in Slovenia and facilitated negotiations between Slovene authorities and the JNA regarding the withdrawal of the JNA from Slovenia.^[11] In Croatia, armed combat continued and the JNA shelled the city of Osijek the same evening the agreement was signed.^[13] The federal presidency ordered the complete withdrawal of the JNA from Slovenia on 18 July in response to Slovene actions in breach of the Brioni Agreement.^[14] The ECMM's scope of work was expanded to include Croatia on 1 September.^[15] By mid-September, the war had escalated as the Croatian National Guard and police blockaded the JNA barracks and the JNA embarked on a campaign against Croatian forces.^[16]

The Brioni Agreement isolated Marković who tried to preserve the federation, but was ignored by van den Broek who appeared not to comprehend issues presented before him, and the EC delegation tacitly encouraged the dissolution of Yugoslavia.^[5] The agreement diminished the authority of part of the JNA's leadership who fought for the preservation of the Yugoslav federation.^[17] The agreement was also unfavourable for Croatia because it was left to defend against the JNA and Serb forces.^[12] By effectively removing Slovenia from influence of the federal authorities, especially the JNA, the agreement fulfilled one of the Serbian nationalists' goals, allowing the redrawing of international borders.^[17] Sabrina Ramet noted that Kučan and Milošević reached an agreement in January 1991 in which Milošević gave his assurances that Slovenia's independence bid would not be opposed by Serbia. In return, Kučan expressed his understanding for Milošević's interest to create a Greater Serbia.^[5]

At the time, the EC viewed the agreement as a method of defusing the crisis and failed to attribute the lull which coincided with the Brioni Agreement to a shift in Serbian strategy instead. The EC delegation's failure to respond to Jović's departure before the plenary meeting and the EC foreign ministers' declaration of 10 July indicating the EC would withdraw from mediation if the Brioni Agreement was not implemented only encouraged Serbia which, unlike Slovenia, Croatia, or the Yugoslav federation, had nothing to lose if the EC pulled out.^[18] In the end, the EC took credit for a rapid resolution of the armed conflict in Slovenia without realising that its diplomatic efforts had little to do with the situation on the ground.^[5]

Footnotes

1. Ahrens 2007, p. 42
2. O'Shea 2005, p. 15
3. CIA 2002, pp. 59–60
4. Mesić 2004, p. 129
5. Stokes 2009, p. 98
6. Mesić 2004, pp. 130–131
7. Valentić 2010, p. 144
8. Mesić 2004, p. 131
9. Mesić 2004, pp. 129–131
10. UCDP, pp. 1–4
11. Ahrens 2007, p. 43
12. Sharp 1997, p. 10
13. O'Shea 2005, p. 16
14. Woodward 1995, p. 171
15. Miškulin 2010, p. 310
16. CIA 2002, pp. 95–97
17. Woodward 1995, p. 169
18. Libal 1997, p. 20

References

Books

• Ahrens, Geert-Hinrich (2007). Diplomacy on the Edge: Containment of Ethnic Conflict and the Minorities Working Group of the Conferences on Yugoslavia. Washington, D.C.: Woodrow Wilson Center Press. ISBN 9780801885570.
• Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Russian and European Analysis (2002). Balkan Battlegrounds: A Military History of the Yugoslav Conflict, 1990–1995. Washington, D.C.: Central Intelligence Agency. ISBN 9780160664724. OCLC 50396958.
• Libal, Michael (1997). Limits of Persuasion: Germany and the Yugoslav Crisis, 1991–1992. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 9780275957988.
• Mesić, Stjepan (2004). The Demise of Yugoslavia: A Political Memoir. Budapest, Hungary: Central European University Press. ISBN 9789639241817.
• O'Shea, Brendan (2005). The Modern Yugoslave Conflict 1991–1995: Perception, Deception and Dishonesty. London, England: Routledge. ISBN 9780415357050.
• Sharp, Jane M. O. (1997). Honest Broker Or Perfidious Albion?: British Policy in Former Yugoslavia. London, England: Institute for Public Policy Research. ISBN 9781860300158.
• Stokes, Gale (2009). "Independence and the Fate of Minorities, 1991–1992". In Ingrao, Charles W.; Emmert, Thomas Allan. Confronting the Yugoslav Controversies: A Scholars' Initiative. West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University Press. pp. 83–114. ISBN 9781557535337.
• Valentić, Mirko (2010). Rat protiv Hrvatske: 1991. – 1995.; velikosrpski projekti od ideje do realizacije [War Against Croatia: 1991–1995; Greater Serbia Projects from Inception to Implementation] (in Croatian). Slavonski Brod, Croatia: Croatian Institute of History, Department for the History of Slavonia, Srijem and Baranja. ISBN 9789536659517.
• Woodward, Susan L. (1995). Balkan Tragedy: Chaos and Dissolution After the Cold War. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press. ISBN 9780815795131.

Other sources

• "Brioni Declaration – July 18, 1991" (PDF). Uppsala Conflict Data Program. 8 July 1991. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 March 2012.
• Miškulin, Ivica (October 2010). ""Sladoled i sunce" – Promatračka misija Europske zajednice i Hrvatska, 1991.–1995." ["Ice cream and sun" – European Community Monitor Mission and Croatia, 1991–1995]. Journal of Contemporary History (in Croatian) (Croatian Institute of History) 42 (2): 299–337. ISSN 0590-9597.