BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA

Serbs in Mostar

AIM Mostar, 23 October, 1996

Once a upon a time, when a Western film company wished to shoot a movie on Cyprus about a love affair between a UN soldier and a girl from the island, it was faced with a big problem - should the girl be a Greek, the Turks would get sore, and vice versa. A solution was found by making the "blue helmet" fall in love with an Armenian girl, member of a small ethnic group on Cyprus.

If anybody should decide to make a film story about love between an IFOR soldier and a girl from Mostar, the girl would have to be found among the remaining Serbs in this city, in order not to make either the Croats or the Bosniacs angry. After two Mostar wars, the Serbs in the city have been reduced to the number of the Armenians on Cyprus. While there were 24,500 or 18.2 per cent of them before the aggression of the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) and Serb volunteers on this city, not counting "Yugoslavs" among whom there are a lot of those who nowadays declare themselves as the Serbs, now there are less than 2,000 according to one, or more than 3,000 according to another source.

And they are living in the city which is ethnically homogeneous - apparently absurdly - ethnically divided themselves. They live on two banks of the river gathered in two groups: the Serb Civic Council on the Biosniac side of the city and the Serb National Community on the Croat side. And, as both are close to the ruling parties on their respective sides of the city, as expected, on the level of leaderships these two groups are in serious disagreement. At the era of national parties, these two gropus found themselves on rival election lists of candidates in the latest June local elections in Mostar. Leaders of the Serb National Community, headed by Prof. Milan Bodiroga, were on the list of the Croat Democratic Community, and those of the Serb Civic Council headed by their President Ratko Pejanovic were on the list "For United Mostar" headed by the Party of Democratic Action. Candidates from the Serb Civic Council in fact made up the Serb quota of four city councillors which will bring a majority to the Eastern Mostar coalition "For United Mostar" in the City Council, if it ever becomes operational.

The notorious "Serb discord", when speaking of Mostar, begins concerning even the current number of the Serbs in the city.

"On the eastern bank, there are 650 of us. In 1994, there were 560 of us. We know that because the Red Cross and Merhamet brought us canned pork at the time and we made a census of the Serb population. During the last war year, ninety Serbs came back and that brings us to the figure of 650", says Ratko Pejanovic, commander of the Fire Brigade on the eastern bank of the Neretva.

According to declarations of the officials of the Serb National Community from the west bank, there are about 3,000 Serbs over there.

"I doubt that there are that many of them. When I was talking about how many of us there are on the eastern bank, I offered lists in which they could see for themselves how many of us there were - precisely with the names nad family names and addresses of each and every person. We asked them to give us similar lists, to see that the figure of 3,000 was not just a tall story, but we have never gotten them although we officially addressed the agencies of Herzeg-Bosnia and the municipal council of the western part of Mostar. They base this figure on the fact that on Easter they distributed 800 family packages. According to these calculations it would turn out that there are on the average four members in each family, and this is impossible because mostly elderly persons have remained on this territory and just an insignificant number of persons belonging to the middle generation. Therefore, I believe that this figure is incorrect and I think that on the western bank there cannot be more than 1000 or 1200 Serbs, because this assessment is realistic, if we are to judge by the number of distributed packages", says Pejanovic.

Unfortunately, Professor Bodiroga avoided the opportunity to deny Pejanovic and to tell the story about the Serbs on the west bank. He ignored the telephone request for a conversation, maybe because he believed that it had been a telephone provocation which is, to be honest, the least evil which can happen to anyone in Mostar. Therefore, we are stuck with the "East Side Story" and Ratko Pejanovic.

"When speaking about decrease of the Serb population, I must say that in 1992, when the Chetnik crime occurred, I will not say Serb, because by doing it I would include myself in the context - it was not easy to remain and survive as a Serb. Many left later, when the conflict between the Bosniacs and the Croats began. In a single day, nine buses with 450 Serbs left. These 560 did not leave even then. On 11 May 1992, at half past ten, I left this bank running away from Chetnik crime. Four days before that I lost the first child, our first victim from the fire brigade, a boy of 27. I was not hiding on the other bank. I took two vehicles and a complete unit over there. I did not hide like a beast, but I put myself in the service of the city again, but was discharged from the post of the commander of the fire brigade only because I was a Serb and I claim this with full responsibility. I do not think that God predestined me to be a commander, that would be completely crazy... But I was hurt by the manner in which I was replaced only because of my name and my family name, and nobody asked me for my name when I took my men to extinguish fires, saving people both here and there... And I am known in this city. When I experienced that, I can only imagine what happened to people who were anonymou and, say, a group of criminals, robbers broke into their houses.

"All things considered, it was difficult to be a Serb here. On an occasion in 1994, Safet Orucevic, the then mayor of the eastern part of Mostar, said to Bishop Atanasije Jevtic: 'You think that you are a greater Serb than these people over here, and I am telling you that there are no greater Serbs than these two. (Obren Lozo and I were sitting with them) I am telling you that it was not easy to be a Serb in '92 and '93, and persist and survive over here'. I think that this is really very true", says Pejanovic.

When the conflict between the Bosniac and the Croats began, the position of the Serbs somewhat improved, citizens of Mostar were not only target of Serb guns, so the Serbs themselves stopped being a target. Is there any difference between the position of the Serbs on the east and the west bank of the river?

"Yes, there is. When you establish a contact with those people over there, they still whisper when talking to you. If nothing else, we over here, at least talk loudly. I think that here, on the eastern bank, we are not deprived of our fundamental human rights. There are cases of individuals trying to usurp abandoned Serb hiouses. However, whenever the owner appears, we start proceedings and give the case a legal support, and give back the man his land and home. We have a case of a man who left for medical treatment due to a cerebral haemorrhage in 1995, and when he returned, he found a Bosniac in it who had come from abroad. We started proceedings, which lasted approximately 2.5 to three months, and we managed to resolve it and gave this man back his home. His appartment was robbed, but it is known who the perpetrator of this criminal act is, criminal charges were brought against him and he will be prosecuted. I don't think that anyone is immune to certain, I should say, minor problems, but if these problems will be solved, then it means that they are not real problems, because anybody who intends to begin anything of the kind will think twice whether it is worth his while before he takes such steps. As opposed to that, I don't know whether in the western part of Mostar they can boast of anything of the kind. In the western part, Prof. Milan Bodiroga, as an exponent of the official policy is protected and he can solve certain cases, which he chooses to solve, but these are individual cases. And there is another thing: regardless of the fact that the European administration would be ready to invest into construction of the Orthodox church, I am not sure that a single stone could be put into it without approval of the official authorities. And we got such an approval and without any problems construction works on the church were completed...", says Pejanovic.

As time passes it seems to bring two banks of the river in Mostar closer to each other. One of the first steps is election of a joint City Council, one of the members of which is Ratko Pejanovic. This is how a more favourable situation is created for rapprochement of the rather small Serb community in Mostar. Are they planning closer contacts?

"If speaking of the Serb National Community, I have nobody else but Bodiroga to establish contact with. Apart from him, there is no other agency which a man could contact. And as concerning operation of the Serb Civic Council on the western bank of the Neretva - we have had a permit from the agencies of Herzeg-Bosnia for more than a year now on the territory controlled by the Croat Defence Council (HVO). But who is crazy enough to go to Livno and initiate such an activity, or to Tomislavgrad, Kupres, and to say nothing about Drvar? Before the elections in Mostar, at a meeting in Hotel Ero which was attended, among other, by Mirko Pejanovic as the President of the Serb Civic Council, a very serious man of principle promised he would initiate foundation of the Serb Civic Council in the western part of Mostar which made me angry: Are we to allow division of Mostar again, this time through the Serb Civic Council, to have one council here and another one over there. I suggest that we have only one Council, have people from both banks active in it and appear together, but to form the council where it will act on its own

• it would mean to support division of the city. I was told not to make problems about it, to let things take their natural course, and later on we would integrate them. Alright, I agreed. However, a couple of days after that, that same man calls me and says that nothing would come out of the business, because he too got scared because the others did not want to accept it. This means that there is absolutely no chance that anybody could officially carry on any activity concerning the Serb Sivic Council on the other side. That is why it happens that quite a few people from the other side come to my office or home asking for protection of their rights. If I wished to speak about communication of the citizens of Serb nationality on one and the other bank - I could freely and frankly say that we do have a communication with the Serbs on the other side, but if we are talking about these two associations, then we don't. When speaking of further conception of development and program orientation, then I must say that we have never given up on citizens of Serb nationality in the western part of Mostar. We have not given up on honest Serbs in Republica Srpska either. Even in our program orientation for next year we plnned forming a committee whose task and aim is to establish relations with the Serbs on the territory of Republica Srpska. Out of the past four months I have spent a month and a half travelling to Nevesinje, Gacko, Bilece, Trebinje... Therefore, we have not given up on the territory of RS for operation among honest citizens devoted to B&H the way it should be - undivided, integral, sovereign, independent, within its post Second World War borders. We are aware that in the contacts with the Serbs in western Mostar we should not act rashly, but I hope that, as the city comes to life again and as more normal conditions for life in the city are created, we will be able to operate and work undisturbed", says Pejanovic.

On the eve of the elections in Bosnia & Herzegovina, a great crisis occurred in Mostar when 150 Bosniacs came to Podhum, a part of the city on the western bank of the city controlled by the Croats, with the intention to clear up ruins of their homes, which was experieneced on the Croat side as a provocation. A dangerous conflict was avoided by agreement between mayor Prskalo and assistant mayor Orucevic to reconstruct 70 Bosniac and 70 Croat houses to which their owners would return. Does the Serb community recognize a possibility for its return in such solutions?

"On the occasion of visits of citizens of Mostar who live in Serbia, Safet Orucevic twice offered the association of the citizens of Mostar in Belgrade, and there are Croats, Bosniacs and Serbs among them over there, to make a list of a hundred people who would return, to make a pilot project of return. In agreement with the President of this Association, former mayor Radmilo Andric alias Braca, we decided to form a kind of a committee with three of us from Mostar, three or four of them from Belgrade, and suggested that they offer the first group of about ten people who would be ready to return, as soon as possible. I am angry because no answer has arrived from Belgrade yet. It would be very ugly if we started saying that Safet Orucevic is not letting us come back. In fact, we are wrong, because if they had sent me the list, I would have forwarded it to the authorities, and if they would have done nothing for six months, then I would have had reason to call Orucevic to account - you have not done what you had promised to do. Who are you talking to about 'multi this and multi that'... However, now you cannot tell him anything, because these compatriots of mine have not done their part of the work. We have not even sent the names of the group for the committee yet, and what is most important, we have not sent the list of people ready to return, and many of those who came here for a visit declared that they wished to return", says Ratko Pejanovic, one of those people who have, among other, by their honourable attitude in both Mostar wars, extinguishing fires in the buildings, but also in inter-ethnic relations, enabled survival of the small Serb community in Mostar and opened a new space for return of those people who have left their city not in order to shoot at it, and there were unfortunately such individuals, but in order to run away from such shooting.

GORAN VEZIC