One way to handle the Minsk agreements

Independent, Uk - Last week’s Minsk agreements promised a ceasefire, but offered no resolution to the standoff at Debaltseve, a transport hub in the east of Ukraine where government forces were partly surrounded. From almost the moment the deal was signed, Russian President Vladimir Putin insisted “rebel forces” had undertaken a “defensive encirclement operation” of the town. Until today, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko insisted it remained under Ukrainian control. That Putin’s assessment was closer to the truth – but both sides were ready for the fight – raises questions as to how realistic a ceasefire was ever likely to be.

Debaltseve isn't the first town to endanger a critical peace accord. Here's a precedent  which should be studied

Guardian, 2014 - Brcko looks like any small Bosnian city. Smoke-filled cafes line the pedestrianised main street, serving bitter coffee against the blaring backdrop of another regional speciality: high-octane turbo-folk music.

But behind Brcko’s quotidian façade lies a novel political experiment. In the impressive Hapsburg-era city hall sits a municipal assembly with powers that more closely resemble a sovereign state. Brcko (pronounced "Britchko") is almost entirely self-governing. As well as its own education system, the city has free-standing courts and separate health and police services. It is, in essence, a free city in Europe.

Brcko has profited by being unshackled from Bosnia. While ethnic tension arguably holds the rest of the country back, this city of 100,000 people has become a beacon for multi-ethnicity: the mayor is Croat, his deputy is Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) and the assembly’s speaker is Serb. The concept of a free city in Europe may not be new – the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gdansk) was semi-autonomous between the two world wars, while Fiume (now Rijeka) was once administered separately from both Hungary and Croatia-Slavonia – but Brcko has given the idea new life.

The unusual arrangement is a product of Brcko’s bloodstained recent history. A border city, pressed close against Croatia and Serbia, it was mainly Bosniak when war broke out in 1992. Brcko became caught in the "corridor" linking two big chunks of Serb-held territory – one in north-western Bosnia, the other in the east. Serb forces needed it desperately, and stormed into the city, expelling Bosniaks and detaining hundreds in brutal camps. Torn apart during the fighting, Brcko then became a thorn in the peace: both the Bosniak/Croat and Serb contingents claimed it as their own. An inability to agree about the destiny of the city almost scuttled the 1995 Dayton Agreement that ended the war. Brcko was strategically vital in the Bosnian war, a mainly Bosniak city caught in the corridor between two Serb-controlled areas

In 1999, presided over by the US diplomat Roberts Owen, arbitrators announced a controversial decision: Brcko would formally be part of both parts of the new state of Bosnia and Herzegovina – the Federation and Republika Srpska – but it would also be a separate "mixed" entity. Brcko District, an appellation lifted straight from US constitutional jargon, was born, overseen by an international supervisor. Advertisement

For people whose lives had been destroyed by tribal hatred, Brcko became a chance to experiment in multi-ethnicity. For example, while in Bosnia and Herzegovina education is often segregated, Brcko took a different approach. All pupils study a single, common curriculum: Serbs, Bosniaks and Croats are mixed in every classroom....