SARAJEVO, July 30 (Hina) - The Archbishop of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cardinal Vinko Puljic, and Banja Luka Bishop Franjo Komarica on Friday sent a special letter to participants in the Sarajevo Stability Pact summit requesting that
refugees and displaced people be finally enabled to return to their pre-war homes. According to a statement from the Catholic press agency (KTA), Puljic and Komarica said the Sarajevo meeting was a sign of hope for hundreds of thousands of Bosnian citizens who were deprived of their rights. They added it was time for responsible officials to see that those people are given back their basic human and civil rights, including their ethnic and religious rights. The two bishops assessed that the Dayton agreement was almost not being implemented at all in the segment regarding the return of refugees, especially in the Bosnian Serb entity. "Of more than
SARAJEVO, July 30 (Hina) - The Archbishop of Bosnia-Herzegovina,
Cardinal Vinko Puljic, and Banja Luka Bishop Franjo Komarica on
Friday sent a special letter to participants in the Sarajevo
Stability Pact summit requesting that refugees and displaced
people be finally enabled to return to their pre-war homes.
According to a statement from the Catholic press agency (KTA),
Puljic and Komarica said the Sarajevo meeting was a sign of hope for
hundreds of thousands of Bosnian citizens who were deprived of
their rights. They added it was time for responsible officials to
see that those people are given back their basic human and civil
rights, including their ethnic and religious rights.
The two bishops assessed that the Dayton agreement was almost not
being implemented at all in the segment regarding the return of
refugees, especially in the Bosnian Serb entity.
"Of more than 220,000 displaced Croats and Catholics from northern
parts of the Republika Srpska, three and a half years after the
signing of the Dayton agreement, only 500 have returned", they said
reminding that Bosniaks and Croats had considerable problems in
reclaiming their property in the Serb entity and that only 460 of
30,000 claims for the repossession of property had been processed.
The two bishops also accused international organisations of rarely
including Croats in their return programmes.
The Serb authorities have still not returned the Catholic church in
the Banja Luka diocese its 22 buildings which have been occupied,
and they do not want to give any information on the fate of two
kidnapped Catholic parish priests.
"We are convinced that much more can be done at a faster pace for the
normalisation of the overall legal, political and economic
situation, only if there is the necessary political willingness",
the letter said.
(hina) rml