Bosnian Prisoners Freed

SARAJEVO: With just hours to spare before a midnight deadline, the Bosnian government and the Bosnian Serbs exchanged over 200 prisoners of war on Friday. Though it wasn't a complete success, since the Red Cross believes that there are some 900 POWs being held by the two sides, TIME's Dean Fischer reports that "the State Department may be willing to live with this, if they have reassurances that the rest will be released soon." Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke helped engineer the release, arriving in Sarajevo on Thursday to turn up the heat. Up to that point, says Fischer, the Bosnian government was refusing to release any POWs until the Serbs accounted for more than 20,000 missing people. "Holbrooke has demonstrated that he's got a lot of ability in getting agreements done," says Fischer, "so it's not surprising that he was able to pull this out of the fire."