IOM OPENS OFFICES IN GLINA & KNIN & DARUVAR AND OSIJEK

( Editorial: --> 8915 ) GLINA, March 11 (Hina) - In the next several months, the Geneva- based International Organisation for Migrations (IOM) will open branch offices in Glina, Knin, Daruvar and Osijek. The IOM already has a central office in Zagreb. The office will start implementing a program of return of refugees to Croatia's war-affected regions, with the help of the US government and the US government agency USAID and in cooperation with the Croatian government and local authorities, said assistant coordinator of the IOM project for Croatia Zoran Milovic, at a meeting with Glina municipal authorities on Wednesday. The IOM office in Zagreb was opened in 1992 and Croatia became an IOM member in 1993. The IOM had organised transport of some 100,000 displaced people and refugees to the area of former Yugoslavia, it was said at the meeting. The most important tasks the IOM faces are the organisation of transport of returnees to the Croatian Danubian area and returnees from that recently reintegrated part of Croatia. The IOM would assist in the reconstruction of war-ravaged and damaged communal infrastructure and the removal of mines, in cooperation with local authorities, said Milovic, adding that projects for the financing of family-owned farms and plants were being prepared. This spring the IOM will start preparing a project of return of Croats to Republika Srpska, in cooperation with the international community and charity organisations. The IOM will provide returnees with transport and reconstruct their houses and commercial facilities. The project envisages that 1,000 persons will return to the Bosnian Serb entity in the first phase. (hina) mm rm 112107 MET mar 98