IN SIX MONTHS 8 TO 10 THOUSAND NON-MUSLIMS RETURN TO SARAJEVO

( Editorial: --> 339 ) SARAJEVO, Oct 12 (Hina) - Within the six months of the true implementation of the Sarajevo Declaration on the Return of Refugees between eight and ten thousand non-muslims have returned to Sarajevo, Mirza Hajric, President of the Head Committee for the implementation of the Declaration, said on Monday. He told a press conference in Sarajevo that a precise assessment of the number of minority members was not possible due to the fact that a great majority was not registering with local authorities. In the last six months municipal authorities had received 15,328 requests for return by pre-war bearers of tenent's rights, and 1,500 housing units had been vacated to place pre-war non-muslim tenants, an act based on current legal regulations. In line with the Declaration, which was made last February, 20 thousand pre-war inhabitants of the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina are to return by the end of the year, particularly those of Croat or Serb nationality. Hajric said today that the document had set "an unrealistic goal based on suspicious analyses" at the very beginning, and that the return was slowed down first of all because the process was not progressing equally in all parts of Bosnia-Herzegovina. According to him, only in Sarajevo there were 74,000 refugees from Republika Srpska who were not being allowed to return by the authorities of Republika Srpska. Hajric said that numerous obstacles to the implementation of the Sarajevo Declaration had been removed, and that the process would speed up once the financial help for the reconstruction of nearly 6,000 damaged flats increased. Commenting on the slow work of the municipal services in charge of settling applications for the return of flats, Hajric said that they had been swamped by the requests, and were thus not capable of honouring the 30 day period for solving the issues. (hina) jfk/ ljl 121925 MET oct 98