SARAJEVO DECLARATION ON REFUGEE RETURN YIELDS POOR RESULTS

SARAJEVO, Sept 22 (Hina) - Twenty moths after the signing of the Sarajevo declaration on the return of non-Muslim refugees to the Bosnian capital, poor results have been recorded in its implementation, it was said at a round table organised by the Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia-Herzegovina (HDZ BiH) Youth in Sarajevo on Wednesday. The president of the Sarajevo Canton HDZ branch, Mladen Bevanda, said that 711 Croat families who had applied for return to their pre-war homes in Sarajevo were still waiting to exercise their right while Bosniak authorities were trying to present the situation in a better light than it really was. An assistant minister for social policy and refugees in the Government of the Croat-Muslim Federation, Davor Cordas, said the number of Sarajevo residents was almost 500,000, which was 90% of the city's pre-war population, but the capital also experienced dramatic demographic changes. "Almost 80 percent of the current residents of Sarajevo are refugees or displaced people and 30 per cent of them arrived in Sarajevo from the Republika Srpska", said Cordas presenting data which have been little known so far. Of the 35,000 registered pre-war Sarajevo residents of Croat nationality, 16,000 left the city during the war and their return is proceeding at a very slow pace, often because of the lack of understanding on the part of international representatives. Damir Ljubic, advisor on refugees and social policy to the President of the state Presidency, Ante Jelavic, said the international community did not have equal criteria for refugees. Ljubic recalled that there were 1,250,000 refugees and displaced people living in Bosnia. Most of them - 600,000 - had been expelled from the Bosnian Serb entity. A total of 550,000 had fled Bosniak- dominated parts of the BH Federation, while 100,000 had fled Croat- dominated areas. Despite these figures, the Croat side has demonstrated an exceptional level of cooperation, enabling the return of almost 4,000 Serbs to Drvar and 3,500 Bosniaks to Stolac and 8,000 Bosniaks to Jajce, said Ljubic. "Only 400 Croats, of the 160,000 Croats who had been expelled from the Republika Srpska, have returned to date to that part of Bosnia- Herzegovina", he added. Ljubic believes the Croat side is least responsible for the poor results in the return of non-Bosniaks to Sarajevo because there are only 200 families living in Sarajevo which had earlier lived in Croat-dominated parts of Bosnia-Herzegovina. (hina) jn rml