Returning Refugees, Unemployed Soldiers
Create Volitile Mix in Unstable Economy
SARAJEVO, May 6 (Reuters) — Violent crime may be on the rise in Bosnia as demobilized soldiers without jobs and returning refugees contend for the country's few economic scraps, a U.N. police spokesman said on Monday. "We're worried we may be seeing the beginning of a rise in violent crime after a couple recent bomb incidents," said U.N. police spokesman Alexander Ivanko."A car bomb exploded in Zavidovici on Sunday and the car's owner, a refugee returned from Slovenia, was killed. West of Banja Luka a bomb recently went off in a restaurant and a cook lost a foot. It seems to have been a business dispute." Ivanko said U.N. police monitors, who work unarmed and without the power of arrest throughout Bosnia, are watching the trend closely.
Diplomats and aid workers have been warning for months that demobilized soldiers and returning refugees could create a volatile mix in an economy barely staggering to its feet after 43 months of war. They say competition for scarce jobs, housing, and business opportunities could turn murderous unless billions of dollars in promised international reconstruction aid flows promptly.
Many Bosnians who remained in the country throughout the war and endured incredible hardships bitterly resent having to compete with newly-returned refugees who rode out the conflict in western Europe. Other violent, inter-ethnic incidents are occurring along the boundary line which divides Bosnia's Serb republic from its Muslim-Croat federation. Supposedly a porous administrative demarcation, the line functions more like a border, giving rise to severe tensions.
There have been a number of well-publicized confrontations along the line between refugees attempting to return to their homes and rival ethnic groups blocking them in recent weeks. Less dramatic, but equally worrying, are violent incidents in areas where the location of the boundary line is disputed.
Ivanko said there has been "an ongoing problem for two or three days" in the western Sarajevo suburb of Dobrinja, where the boundary snakes through mid-rise apartment blocks. Muslim-Croat and Serb representatives have been negotiating for months to try to rationalise the location of the line, which bisects some buildings and possibly even some flats, but without success.
U.N. police reported on Monday that shots had been fired on two successive nights in the affected neighbourhood and a hand grenade had been thrown. Three other unexploded hand grenades were found lying on a local street. "There's a great feeling of frustration among the residents on both sides of the line beacuse the situation has not been resolved," Ivanko said.
"We are very concerned about Dobrinja and we are maintaining a permament presence in the area. NATO is also running patrols out there."
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