Yugoslav Refugees in B&H

Sandzak Moving to Sarajevo

AIM Sarajevo, 31 March, 1999

With three children and two small bags, she has fled from a village near Novi Pazar: "We let the livestock go, left the house and descended to the road. We entered the bus to Sarajevo, the first one that came by. I don't know where to go now, I have no relatives here. Maybe someone offers us shelter, at least for a couple of nights until we see what to do", says a woman with a dappled scarf on her head at the hall of Sarajevo railway station transformed into the bus terminal where refugees from neighbouring FR Yugoslavia are arriving every day. MOstly from Sandzak. Asked what she was running away from and why, she explains that she is afraid. To the question what she is afraid of - whether the Muslims are called up in Sandzak, whether there are planted explosives, threats, provocations, plundering, breaking into homes, murders, rape, sacking from jobs - the woman we are talking to says that for the time being there is none of the listed, but that remembering pictures from Bosnia, they are simply afraid.

A man who is a little over 35 arrived from Priboj a few days ago. He is staying with his relatives in Sarajevo and does not know how long he will stay. He even accepts the possibility to be accommodated in one of the collective centres in B&H Federation, just as long as he is not sent back to Sandzak: "The Serbs are all armed, way back when the war in B&H began they were given arms. All we could do was wait when they will come to get us and send us to Kosovo to kill our own people, to shoot at children... Whoever has just once seen pictures from Bosnia recognises the same scenario, and I will not shoot at children!"

Three girls from Sjenica in Sandzak are also in the hall of the railway station. They came five days ago and are staying with the uncle of one of them. Fearing possible developments in whole of FR Yugoslavia, their parents had forced them to go to Sarajevo. One of them explains that nothing unusual is happening yet, but fear is strong. The other adds that there are "many members of the reserve forces, they stop us in the street, ask for identity papers, then provoke - where will you hide from the war, who will take care of you, and similar".

In the premises of Sarajevo railway station, a registration point for the newly-arrived has been set up - at two windows where train tickets were sold before the war, a long queue of Yugoslav refugees are waiting now. There are sign-posts all over the building saying "Registration of the newly-arrived - Windows 1 and 2". We ask the lady behind the dark glass of the window who she is working for and who she is registering refugees for: "Ask the federals about everything, they are the ones who are doing this to you, just ask them. Adnan is in charge of this". To a repeated question whether these "federals" have a name, and Adnan a family name and a job, she says with regret: "I really don't know, we are here just to register people".

Further away, at the bar of one of the prewar railway station cafes, a white tablecloth and a large group of people. Food is distribited here - bread, bananas or apples, milk, juice, boxes of jam... We ask the young men who are distributing food about the organisers, and they reply it is the Ministry of Civil Affairs and Communications. A crying woman says that she arrived a day before with two children from Priboj. She has no accommodation, she spent the night at an unknown woman's place who had offered her to stay at her home: "I worked in a factory which is making missiles for the Army of Yugoslavia. We worked days and night, and who knows when NATO will discover that factory and start to shoot at it", she talks about her fears. A woman standing next to her adds that she too has fled for fear of the war spreading from Kosovo and of possible NATO operations: "Yugoslav Army has distributed anti-aircraft cannons along the border in Muslim villages. What will happen to us when NATO begins to bomb there", she says. A lady approaches the group of refugees: "I can take a woman with a child in my home", she says. The crying woman with two children asks whether she can be the one and gets an affirmative answer. We ask the lady who is offering accommodation for motives of her hospitality: "I have no special motive, I am a born Sarajevan and have nobody in Sandzak. But I have spent the war here and I know what it is like. These are our Muslims, we must help them. I do not have much to offer - a bed and a plate and spoon, but I think that is better than nothing".

According to the still unofficial data about eight thousand refugees from Yugoslavia have arrived in B&H Federation, more than six thousand of whom are Muslims from Sandzak, and a little less than two thousand banished persons from Kosovo. Although such ratio of refugees from Sandzak and Kosovo is explained by the impossibility to cross from Kosovo into B&H Federation, many are sceptical that it is a matter of possible political connection of Sandzak and a part of the Federation controlled by Izetbegovic, especially because Bosniac leaders issue statements only concerning protection of Bosniacs in Sandzak and when promoting Sulejman Ugljanin (Izetbegovic's emmissary from Sandzak too often seen in Sarajevo) who is in Sandzak considered to be "the traitor who always runs away in difficult situations"

At the Union of the people from Sandzak in Sarajevo they do not wish to assess the number of their newly arrived compatriots, and the secretary of the Union, Hakija Culjevic, says that the Union has taken a firm stand not to give any data concerning displacement to third countries "because their objective is for these people to return home as soon as possible after the situation pacifies". To the question whether he thinks there will be enough space in refugee centres for reception of refugee Muslims from Sandzak, he replies that the state Ministry of Civilian Issues and Communications is in charge of that and that probably new collective centres will be opened for them in B&H Federation, but reveals also that the Ministry (the same one which claims that it has not enough money for B&H refugees) is considering the possibility of constructing a special settlement for refugees. Culjevic does not wish to speak about the location and capacity of this facility, but says: "minister Recica has already suggested two or three locations and it is still early to talk about it". Asked to comment whether in case the people from Sandzak refused to return home (as claimed in polls of many B&H media) this would help nationalistic plans on ethnically pure territories in former Yugoslavia, Culjevic mitigated his initial statement: "It will not be a classical settlement, it will be a refugee collective centre, and we are politically striving to effectuate the idea of return".

From the policemen patrolling around the railway station we learn that there are no incidents, but also that a small number of them who have no accommodation sleep in the station building. By bus, UNHCR is transporting them free of charge to collective accommodation in Kljuc, Zenica, Rakovica and Tuzla.

There is a much smaller number of refugees from Kosovo in Sarajevo, and in the Club of the Albanians in Sarajevo, they say that a large number of them arrived in the first two days of NATO strikes against Yugoslavia, and then the flow was interrupted because it became impossible to cross over to B&H: "They mostly went towards Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro, but a large number of refugees can be expected, those who had stopped in Montenegro", says the president of the Club, Suada Adzenal. They do not know the exact number of Kosovars who arrived either, but they think that majority of them are staying in Sarajevo with their friends and relatives, and just an insignificant number of them in the collective centre in Rakovica.

"At this moment, cooperation of UNHCR and B&H Council of Ministers remains on the level of consultations about assisting refugees who are coming from Kosovo. But, due to the large number of refugees from Sandzak who are incessantly arriving, it will become necessary to begin with consultations how they should be assisted", says UNHCR spokesman Wendi Rapaport. B&H office of UNHCR does not have the mandate to dislocate these refugees to third countries and the actual aid they are offering at this moment is food and hygienic products provided by UNHCR along with the international Red Cross. They believe in UNHCR that in refugee centres planned for reception of refugees from FR Yugoslavia there is plenty of room because just a small number of them apply for this form of accomodation, but nobody can claim with certainty how many people have arrived in B&H in view of the fact that data are changing every hour. Rapaport says that she does not know anything about the possibility of building a new refugees centre or settlement in Sarajevo or anywhere else in B&H, and she does not wish to comment on such a possibility, but says that something like that can be decided only by B&H Council of Ministers.

In the Ministry of Civilian Affairs and Communications of the B&H Council of Ministers, journalists are sent from one official to another, all the way to minister Nudzeim Recica who is either absent or at a meeting, so there is not a single statement of his in the media nor a stand of this Ministry.

The border of B&H is opened for the citizens of FR Yugoslavia, regardless of which part of it they come from. To enter the country, instead of a passport, it is possible to use the identity card or authenticated birth certificate with a photograph. Media report that Serbs from FR Yugoslavia are fleeing to RS, mostly in fear of call-up or NATO air-strikes, but in AIM Banja Luka editorial office they say that there are no official data on inflow of refugees into this B&H entity. On the other hand, FR Yugoslavia has closed its border for the exit of its citizens, that is, for conscripts - men at the age between 18 and 60 and women whose children are older than five. The state of war has been proclaimed and "working obligation" has been introduced. Nevertheless, men older than 18 and younger than 60 continue to arrive in Sarajevo: "Buses go through the woods, by bridlepath, not at border crossings", they say. They fear possible executions of the Muslims, but also "bombs from the sky". They are dreaming of happier and better life, even in Sarajevo. But, majority of them publicly claim in front of TV cameras that they will not find the needed peace here, but that they should "flee as far as possible from the Balkan". That is why Sarajevans do not know whether to be angry with them or to offer them the help they truly need. Only rare Sarajevans loudly express their fear that they might be deprived of their apartments while they are at work or gone shopping, because a glimpse of the crowded hall of Sarajevo railway station re-opens doubts: What is happening? It there an end to this?

Rubina CENGIC

AIM Sarajevo