RETURN TO RECEPTION CENTRES

Repatriation of Refugees

Banja Luka, 13 March, 1997 (AIM)

Out of 2.5 million Bosnian refugees, only 220 thousand refugees have returned to their homes, so far primarily to regions where their ethnic group is the majority population. At the same time, about 90 thousand members of minority communities in certain regions have fled from their homes and acquired the status of refugees. These data from the Recommendation of the International Crisis Group prepared for the Paris and the London Conference on Bosnia, unambiguously warn that main objectives of the Dayton accords are not attained even after a whole year since their signing.

Responsibility for the failure to implement the agreement on return of refugees was laid by the International Crisis Group at the door of signatories of the Dayton accords, accusing them that they did not wish to discharge their duties. Representatives of the UNHCR are avoiding accusations, but from problems they are facing, it can easily be concluded where the problems are and who is responsible for them.

Based on annual results in implementation of the Dayton accords, the impression is that the authorities in both entities are not interested in cooperation with the UNHCR on problems of repatriation of refugees. The UNHCR in Sarajevo still does not have a complete data base on refugees, which speaks for itself about how interested governments of entities are in having this issue resolved in the manner agreed. Theresa Fernandez, head of the Sarajevo UNHCR office, declared recently that Republica Srpska had not even nominated its representatives for the central working group of the UNHCR for return of refugees, and the main task of this group was to work on repatriation of refugees on the territory of the Federation in the initial phase. Therfore, the problem of return of the Serbs to Mostar and Sarajevo, as the first conceived job has not even been opened.

According to the plan of the UNHCR, repatriation should begin in the first days of April and return of about half a million of refugees to B&H is planned to take place within a year. Strategy of return will be agreed and elaborated next week in two meetings which will take place in the Palace of Nations in Geneva. According to agency news, a regional meeting of commissars for refugees of Croatia, B&H Federation and FR Yugoslavia should be held on 19 March, and a meeting of international donors and representatives of countries which have received refugees from the territory of former Yugoslavia is expected to take place on 21 March.

In Republica Srpska, return of refugees is not even discussed. The emphasis in rhetoric of the local politicians and representatives of state authorities there is still on accommodation of displaced persons who are still in collective centres. There are no demands for return among the refugees either. Hatred sown among the Serb population by political propaganda has reinforced the conviction that joint life was impossible. Accommodation of a large part of rural population among refugees into urban centres and conditions which were their lifelong dream, along with their "integration" in administrative agencies according to the principle of party affiliation, the refugee population has become the most rigid bastion of policy of the ruling Serb Democratic Party (SDS). Such policy resulted in emptying of entire rural regions of Republica Srpska, so that shortage of population appears nowadays as a serious political problem. President of the Republic Biljana Plavsic recently presented to the public the data that there were 550 thousand refugees in RS from central Bosnia, Bosnian Krajina and the Republic of Serb Krajina (RSK). This is almost half of its population, who are awaiting integration and who are not sure what they will choose to be their permanent residence.

On the other hand, demands for return are becoming less frequent, too. The initial turmoil about the return of people from Srebrenica has died down after the Serbs had left Sarajevo. The silent exchange has practically been completed in this way, and it is clear who profitted and who got the worst of it. Voices in favour of return are still echoing only along the border line, in fact in political neuralgic points. Political manipulations with refugees will strictly be controlled to the extent demanded by current political interests. This is confirmed by the fact that instead of state agencies, non-governmental organizations and associations have been engaged with the problem of refugees in B&H Federation. For instance, the Citizens' Forum in Tuzla last year initiated an action of offering aid to refugees and obtained the data that in Tuzla canton there were 1,500 households, or 5,500 people from the region of Bijeljina who wished to return to their homes.

And while stories about return of refugees are still circulating, Muslim refugees from Srebrenica are moving into Serb houses in Sarajevo, and Sarajevo Serbs are moving into Muslim houses in Srebrenica, Bijeljina, Brcko... The Croats have quite some time ago taken possession of Serb towns of Drvar, Grahovo and Petrovac, and they have no intention to let the Serbs return. Last year's attempt of refugees from Drvar to visit their homes and cemeteries ended in a fiasco. The convoy of four buses escorted by international police forces and IFOR was stopped by Croat police 12 kilometres before Drvar and forbade them to enter the town. "We have shed blood because of this, Give us Banja Luka and Derventa", the Serbs were told by angry policemen who threatened and cursed them. General Plummer, commander of IFOR who arrived on the spot, was told that seven thousand Croats were waiting in Drvar and would not let the Serbs go in. After he had passed the rest of the way to Drvar, he returned and told the Serbs that it was not safe to continue and proposed that they return. This, second in a row, visit to Drvar was organized by the Association of Refugees from Drvar whose President Mile Marceta does not conceal his discontent: "The Croats are doing this in agreement with our authorities. This formula is applied for a long time now. Our authorities are refusing to offer us any support".

In the destroyed and robbed Kozarac near Prijedor, refugees from the Republic of Serb Krajina, are repairing Muslim houses and building their own settlements. If this is connected with the Proposal of Measures for Preservation of Republica Srpska made by the headquarters of the president of RSK in Banja Luka and offered to the leadership of RS last June, which proposes urgent stimulation of colonization of RS with the Serbs from RSK who are now living in eastern Slavonia and Kosovo, the political strategy of ruling ethnic elites of all three parties becomes quite clear.

Pressures of some European countries that they would return refugees they had received in their countries disturbed international orgnizations which are engaged in repatriation. High Commissioner for Refugees of the United Nations appealed in the beginning of the year on German authorities to abandon the plan of return of about 300 thousand refugees until conditions for their reception in their home countries were created. High Commissioner Sadako Ogata proposed to German authorities a "differential approach" in returning refugees, in which special treatment should be offered to refugees from regions in which they had been ethnic minorities, and to spouses and children from mixed marriages and former detainees of detention camps.

Under pressure of the international community, the authorities have opened transit centres in Sarajevo, Bihac and Zenica for reception of returnees, and opening of such reception centres is in preparation in Tuzla and Mostar. The UNHCR has made a plan for return of refugees to 22 target regions out of which only three are in RS.

In such a situation, any conversation about return of refugees does not make sense. The agreement between B&H Federation and Germany could have been concluded only with the aim of additional political pressure on uncooperative signatories of the Dayton accords to start implementating the agreed. Refugees will obviously be the instrument of political manipulations again, with unclear and uncertain personal status. Transit centres for their reception, the opening of which is being prepared in a hurry, could become new detention camps in their own country.

Deputy in German parliament, Amke Ditter-Soyer, declared recently that plans for return of refugees were not realistic. Their announcement, according to her words, served only for "arousing false hopes among the German population". "For refugees who should be returning home, there are no possibilities of accommodation, no jobs, nor any other conditions for living. The population in the country will experience them as rivals and as traitors".

Branko Peric