CROATIAN DISPLACED PERSONS STAGE PROTEST RALLY IN VINKOVCI

VINKOVCI, Sept 13 (Hina) - Over 7,000 Croatian displaced persons from Serb-held eastern Croatia, expelled from their homes five years ago when Serb-led Yugoslav forces occupied the Danube river area, protested in Vinkovci on Friday, demanding that they be allowed to return to their homes. "Time is up and we have to return to our homes which are currently under occupation," Mate Simic, president of the Association of Displaced Persons, told a protest rally called "Gentlemen, it's the eleventh hour, time is running out!". Simic called on President Franjo Tudjman to lead the displaced people to Vukovar on January 15 "as he led Croatia to Knin aboard the Freedom Train." The displaced people reiterated their demands that the UN mandate be terminated on January 15 next year and that elections in the Serb-occupied area be held by December 15 this year, in accordance with the Local Government and Self-Goverment Act and taking into account the 1991 population census. They opposed general amnesty being granted to Serbs who had taken part in the armed rebellion against Croatia. The Association said that it was humiliating that the exhumation of the Ovcara mass grave was being covered only by foreign television stations and that the mothers of Croatian soldiers who had been killed in Vukovar were not allowed to pray at Ovcara. The Association also protested about the fact that the UN transitional administration engaged people who had been members of Serb paramilitary forces and the illegal Serb authorities to work in its institutions. (hina) vm jn 131625 MET sep 96