DISPLACED PERSONS VISIT VUKOVAR'S CEMETERIES ( Editorial: --> 7423 )

( Editorial: --> 7423 ) VUKOVAR, Nov 1 (Hina) - About 600 displaced people visited two cemeteries in their home town of Vukovar (under UN Transitional Administration, eastern Croatia) on Saturday, on occasion of All Saint's day. A mass was served at the Catholic cemetery in Stari Vukovar, which was attended by Croatian President's Deputy Chief-of-Staff and president of the National Trust Establishment Committee, Vesna Skare-Ozbolt, and the UN Transitional Administrator for the Croatian Danubian area, William Walker. The displaced persons visited Vukovar's Novo Groblje cemetery in 12 busses and lit candles on the graves of their loved ones for the first time after their exile. Many of them did not find the graves of their closest ones because unidentified persons had also been buried there, and Croatian government experts had not yet investigated the cemetery. The several hundreds graves which hide the remains of people killed during the war, in 1991, also include graves of Serbs, so Croats and Serbs met at the cemetery. All the visits passed calmly, without any incidents. Skare-Ozbolt, Walker and Vukovar's mayor Vladimir Stengl laid wreaths at the Catholic cemetery in Stari Vukovar. They were accompanied in prayer by the deputy president of the National Trust Establishment Committee, Ivica Vrkic, head of the Croatian government Office for Displaced Persons and Refugees, Lovre Pejkovic, Assistant Interior Minister Josko Moric and head of UNTAES's civilian affairs, Gerard Fischer. (hina) lm 011604 MET nov 97