BOSNIAN CROAT SOLDIERS EXCHANGED AFTER ONE YEAR

MOSTAR, August 8 (Hina) - It took one year for Muslim authorities to implement the decision of their President Alija Izetbegovic who on 25 July 1995 pardoned four members of the Croatian Defense Council accused of alleged crimes. The exchange took place yesterday, head of the Office for Exchange of War Prisoners of the Croatian Republic of Herzeg Bosnia, Berislav Pusic, told Hina on Thursday. Pusic said that the statements of Bosniak officials who said that Arab citizens, actually diplomats, had been exchanged yesterday, were incorrect. "All seven of them are members of the former "El Mujahedeen" unit which operated in central Bosnia. They should have been exiled from BH, but we handed them to the Muslim side in order to free our soldiers unfairly imprisoned for three years". "There are no more of our people in Muslim prisons, but we have certain data that some are in Mujahedeen concentration camps of Orasce and Mehuric. I'm convinced that we'll free them, in spite of the dangers", Pusic said. (hina) ha 081748 MET aug 96