SARAJEVO, Jan 17 (Hina) - Bosnian Foreign Minister, Muhamed Sacirbey, rejected accusations that his government refuses to fulfill the Dayton agreement provisions on releasing prisoners of war. Minister Sacirbey stressed that the
Sarajevo government only insisted on the consistent implementation of the Dayton deals. At Wednesday's press conference in Sarajevo Sacirbey said the Dayton agreements envisaged the release of all soldiers and all civilians detained during the war, and each party is obligated to submit complete lists with names of such persons and ensure to the International Red Cross workers free access to prisons and camps.
SARAJEVO, Jan 17 (Hina) - Bosnian Foreign Minister, Muhamed
Sacirbey, rejected accusations that his government refuses to
fulfill the Dayton agreement provisions on releasing prisoners of
war. Minister Sacirbey stressed that the Sarajevo government only
insisted on the consistent implementation of the Dayton deals.
At Wednesday's press conference in Sarajevo Sacirbey said the
Dayton agreements envisaged the release of all soldiers and all
civilians detained during the war, and each party is obligated to
submit complete lists with names of such persons and ensure to the
International Red Cross workers free access to prisons and camps.
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The Minister said that Serbs were the ones who are abstracting
the implementation of the agreement.
'We know of people whose names used to be on the POW lists but
later they have not been put on them, so we demand that the
whereabouts of such people should be found,' said Sacirbey.
He confirmed his statement with messages sent by two Bosniac
(Moslem) detainees from a Serb camp in Rogatica to their families
through the International Red Cross Organization. The names of the
two men have disappeared from the lists and their whereabouts are
unknown.
Sacirbey said in the Bosnian Krajina alone (northwestern
Bosnia), between 700 and 1,000 people are still being held in
secret camps, whom Serbs refuse to free. He added that US Assistant
Secretary of State, John Shattuck, could see what was going in the
Serb-held Bosnian Krajina, during his recent visit to Bosnia.
Sacirbey told the conference about the Bosnian Government's
demand that all people who are being in prisons and camps, should
be set free immediately and that with the assistance of IFOR
(Implementation Force) free and unannounced access be ensured to
such locations. The Bosnian government also demands from Serbs and
the IFOR to ensure access to Ljubija and Srebrenica, where mass
graves are believed to be sited, three days after all POWs are
freed.
(hina) jn lm
171802 MET jan 96