Plavsic waves to her supporters

International Support for Bosnian Serb President

Mr Gelbard was speaking on Wednesday night, a few hours after troops from the NATO-led Stabilisation Force (SFOR) were deployed on the streets of the north-western town of Banja Luka for the second time in under a week, taking control of five police stations.

SFOR troops on the streets of Banja Luka

The deployment was in response to a brewing conflict between police officers loyal to Ms Plavsic and those supporting the former Bosnian Serb leader and indicted war criminal, Radovan Karadzic. Ms Plavsic has accused the Banja Luka police of bugging her telephone lines.

SFOR troops and United Nations police officers discovered huge caches of weapons inside the stations, including grenades, assault rifles and explosives used for making car bombs. Ms Plavsic declared that her opponents had "wanted to shed blood and blame it on the President of the (Bosnian Serb) republic."

One western diplomat commented: "It was staggering. There were piles waist high of rifles...grenades, mines, booby traps, ball bearings."

Some of the weapons uncovered by NATO and the UN

Mr Gelbard claimed that Ms Plavsic's key rival Momcilo Krajisnik, the Serb representative on the Bosnian collective presidency and a close ally of Mr Karadzic, had failed in his bid to win the support of the Bosnian Serb military. "Krajisnik is still attempting to assert his authority over the army, which has refused to accept his control," he said.

The US Envoy said that Washington backed Ms Plavsic's demand for the removal of another opponent, Interior Minister Dragan Kijac. He concluded: "The US feels strongly that Ms Plavsic is in the right, is the person trying to implement the Dayton peace agreement and democratic principles."

Krajisnik is looking increasingly beleaguered

International support for Ms Plavsic provoked an angry response from Bosnian Serb TV, which remains under the control of Mr Karadzic's supporters. She was portrayed as a "quisling" who had collaborated with a "foreign occupation" and compared to the Italian wartime dictator, Benito Mussolini.

Now that Ms Plavsic has established control in Banja Luka, it is likely she will continue to press for elections to a new Bosnian Serb parliament. And the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is meeting in Vienna on Thursday to discuss whether such elections should be held under international supervision.