SEVERAL HUNDRED SERB REFUGEES RETURN TO PLASKI AREA

PLASKI, Sept 11 (Hina) - A joint working group in charge of the two-way return of displaced persons and refugees, comprising representatives of the Croatian government, the UN Transitional Administration in the Danube region (UNTAES) and the UNHCR, held a news conference in Plaski on the two-way return process. Croatian Assistant Reconstruction and Development Minister Stjepan Sterc said that the situation in Plaski, about 150 km south of Zagreb, as regards the return of Serb refugees was much better than portrayed in public. Sterc stressed than Serb refugees should not be returning in an uncontrolled way, in contravention of the agreement between the Croatian government, UNTAES and UNHCR. The press conference heard that several hundred Serbs have returned from the UN-administered Danube region to Plaski in the last month through the mediation of the Croatian Government Office for Displaced Persons and Refugees and UNTAES, and even more have returned outside the regular procedure. In the Plaski municipality, with the current population of 2,600, also live about 1,500 newly-settled Bosnian Croats, who complained that they were under pressure to leave the houses of Serbs who had returned in an irregular way. (hina) vm 112121 MET sep 97