WORLD IN BRIEF : BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA : Rebel Muslim Signs Accord With Serbs

Rebel Muslim leader Fikret Abdic, who controls a patch of northwest Bosnia in defiance of the Muslim-led government in Sarajevo, signed a peace agreement with Bosnian Serbs. He made the pact in Belgrade, Serbia, with Radovan Karadzic of the self-proclaimed Bosnian Serb Republic and Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, who predicted it would “bring peace to half of (Bosnia).” In a joint declaration, Karadzic recognized the Autonomous Province of Western Bosnia, which Abdic set up in the Bihac area after the Bosnian Parliament rejected an international peace plan to end the 18-month civil war in Bosnia. Political sources said the agreement is unlikely to have much practical effect.