January 28, 1995

For more than 1,000 days, Sarajevo has not been this quiet. Children on sleds slide noiselessly over the snow. Trams glide by. At night the lights on the hills climb silently toward the stars, and not a mortar round or a sniper's shot disturbs the peace. The cafes that were once the heart of this city's life are almost full again. A take-out pizza service is doing a reasonable business. Food does not abound, but there is enough to eat. Among the United Nations armored personnel carriers on the streets, there are now a few private cars.

The Senate today approved legislation making it harder for Congress to impose costly new requirements on state and local governments without providing the money for them. The 86-to-10 vote gave bipartisan approval to one of the central elements of the Republican legislative agenda. It also ended three weeks of debate in which Democrats tried futilely to limit the measure's scope. In the end, many ambivalent Democrats joined enthusiastic Republicans to support a measure that is broadly popular with governors and mayors and that President Clinton has endorsed.

On a brisk Saturday morning, while most of their friends were relaxing at home, 16-year-old Jerry Lee and eight other Asian teen-agers huddled over their notebooks and calculators for a full day of math and English lessons. During the week, they all attend public schools in the city. But every Saturday, they go to a Korean hagwon, or cram school, in Flushing to spend up to seven hours immersed in the finer points of linear algebra or Raymond Chandler.

Taking a major step toward full diplomatic relations with Vietnam, the United States announced today that it would open a liaison office in Hanoi on Saturday and sign an agreement to exchange diplomats. The agreement will not establish full diplomatic relations. Low-level diplomats will be exchanged, with the first American diplomats stationed in Vietnam since April 1975, when the final American troops and officials pulled out as Communist troops moved to capture Saigon.

The National Governors' Association has a bipartisan proposal allowing the states to design their own welfare programs. But Administration officials say such a move would be a mistake. Article, page 8.