AUTHORITIES URGE SOLVING HUMANITARIAN DRAMA OF SETTLED REFUGEES

KNIN, Sept 9 (Hina) - The Croatian government urgently needs to take some concrete steps to resolve the serious humanitarian drama being experienced by displaced Croats from Bosnia-Herzegovina currently located in a former military camp near Knin, Knin's town authorities in a statement on Monday. #L# Even after several months of waiting, displaced Croats from Drvar have not been issued with Croatian papers and so they still do not have the right to medical care or social security, while their children cannot enrol in school, the statement read. The Knin authorities maintain that the displaced from Drvar need to be included in a housing programme because living conditions in the Golubic camp are so difficult that, in light of the approaching winter, they might affect the health and lives of the elderly, ill and children. The town's authorities support the demands by these people from Drvar. The authorities believe that the resolution of these serious problems should be attended to by parliament's immigration committee, and the ministries of the interior, foreign affairs and health, as well as by the Administration for Displaced Persons and Refugees, and the local police. The statement said that the relevant government institutions were warned that nothing had been done for this group of displaced persons, except by the Administration for Displaced Persons and Refugees, and that they could be faced with a collective hunger strike by 90 members of 24 refugee families. The mostly Croat displaced in Golubic during the war in Bosnia were expelled or fled from their homes in central Bosnia or Republika Srpska, settling in 1995 in vacated Serb houses in Drvar. They were evicted from these houses in March, when they started coming to Croatia, Knin specifically. The Association Croats Settlers from Drvar last week announced a hunger strike if the Croatian government did not resolve their status. (hina) sp/ha