Protesting were workers whose employment contracts had been terminated on 3 December 1991 when the then management left Vukovar for Zagreb after that town fell into the hands of Serb rebels supported by the Yugoslav People's Army. The sacked workers remained in Vukovar and failed to appear at relocated workplaces or respond to the invitation by the then management.
The leader of the association which gathers the disgruntled workers, Mirko Grahorac, reiterated today that the sacked workers asked that their years of service from the period when they stayed in Vukovar when it was under the control of the Serb statelet Krajina be recognised together with all other labour rights, including their entitlement to severance pay.
He added that he was going to take legal action before the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
Grahorac again pointed the finger at the Independent Democratic Serb Party (SDSS), accusing it of failing to represent the interests of ethnic Serbs.
Yesterday, the SDSS party stated that it supported sacked 'Borovo' workers who were asking for the same rights as other workers in Croatia, but the party distanced itself from announcements that the disgruntled workers might resort to a new 'log revolution' if they were denied their rights.
Earlier this week when he announced the protest rally for Thursday, Grahorac threatened that that the protesters would insist on their demands even at a price of a new 'log revolution', alluding to the setting up of roadblocks by ethnic Serbs in Serb-dominated areas at the start of the war to prevent the Croatian authorities from taking control of them.
This act of threatening with radical measures met with severe criticism from Croatian war veterans' associations as well as from some ethnic Serb leaders. According to the Vecernji List daily, Grahorac was interviewed by the Vukovar police on Wednesday over the said threats.
Thursday's protest rally lasted half an hour with the local police stepping up security measures.
No incidents were reported.
Later in the day, 11 branches of war veterans' associations in Vukovar said that the gathering of the Serb workers reminded them of the days of the log-revolution at the start of the 1991-1995 Homeland War.