Millions of Dispaced War Victims
May Never Go Home Again
GENEVA, May 12 (Reuters) — U.N. officials trying to organize the return or repatriation of more than two million displaced Bosnians fear that as many as as two-thirds of them will never go back to their homes.
The officials, who accompanied U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata on a six-day tour of Bosnia last week, said the trip had shown clearly that the engineers of ethnic cleansing were not willing to see it reversed. Ogata herself tried to stress the positive as she toured Bosnia's major towns and many of its former conflict zones, announcing guidelines for refugee visits across the country's internal boundary line and inter-ethnic bus routes.
One senior UNHCR official, who was with Ogata in meetings with local and regional politicians across Bosnia, told Reuterss: "The message was clear — the outside world wants repatriation, the parties do not." "We'll do what we can, but I'm afraid that at a certain point, if no progress is made, the international community will just throw in the towel."
The Dayton peace accord brokered by the United States and signed last December formally guarantees all Bosnians — Muslims, Serbs and Croats — full freedom of movement and the right to reclaim their homes. Ogata's UNHCR agency was handed the task of delivering on that promise.
On the ground, however, freedom of movement, especially between Bosnia's shaky Muslim-Croat Federation and its Serb Republic, remains an ideal. Rare individuals are crossing the NATO-patrolled boundaries to visit their old homes but very, very few have had the courage to move back into them.
Berserkistan May 10 · Serbs Slammed Over Attack on Refugees, Police, Media
Berserkistan May 9 · Serbs Attack UN and Media Accompanying Muslims
Berserkistan Apr 29 · UN Refugee Chief on Repatriation Mission
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Sadako Ogata Biography
A Multinational Response to Humanitarian Crisis A lecture by Sadako Ogata.
UNHCR as Lead Agency in the Former Yugoslavia Journal of Humanitarian Assistance
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