From: draskovi@usc.edu (Zoran Draskovic)
Newsgroups: soc.rights.human
Subject: Documents 1
Date: 21 Nov 1992 22:56:52 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: aludra.usc.edu


No.8

Report of the Serbian Council
Information Center on Harassment and
Ethnic Cleansing in Western Slavonia
by the Authorities of the Republic of
Croatia



Belgrade
October 1992


Academician Dobrica Cosic
President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Belgrade


Belgrade, October 30, 1992


Honorable Mr. President,


The Serbian Council, a non-political party, non-government and non-profit
organization of independent scientists, writers, artists and other
intellectuals based in Belgrade, now has in its possession a voluminous and
reliable documentation on ethnic cleansing on what were Yugoslav
territories. Condemning all forms of violent changing of ethnic structure
on any and all territories, the Serbian Council, via its Information
Center, submits to you this "Report on Ethnic Cleansing in Western
Slavonia", a part of the Republic of Croatia, where according to data as of
August 15, 1992, 10 urban and 183 village settlements have been completely
ethnically cleansed, and another 87 settlements have been partially
cleansed. This is the first in a series of similar reports which will be
produced in the near future on basis of evidence gathered by associates of
the Serbian Council Information Center.


Western Slavonia was the first region of what used to be Yugoslav territory
where, without a word of condemnation from the domestic and world public,
forced and utterly brutal ethnic cleansing began to take place. The success
of the Croatian authorities to use violence and a feeling of insecurity in
ethnic Serbs to cleanse strategically and economically important
territories for them has, and still does, encourage all those who use the
same practices in other ethnically mixed territories of old Yugoslavia to
do the same, amd especially in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Serbian Council,
bound by its constitutional documents to pay great attention to the
protection of human rights, is not prepared to take into account state
interests, which are used in an attempt to justify ethnic cleansing, but
demands that instead of these, the interests of ethnic groups and
individuals be protected. A recomposition of the ethnic map of old
Yugoslavia's territories, if that is unavoidable in order to avoid future
conflicts, may and must be affected only by respecting the rights and
interests of all ethnic groups, but above all, of all individuals, no
matter what their ethnic and religious background may be.


Because of its size, this report does not contain the documents it is based
on, nor does it contain the deposition given by witnesses, even if they as
the words of the victims themselves would make this report more
interesting. Witness depositions, as a rule in our and similar
organizations engaged on protecting human rights, cannot be published due
to the need to protect the identity of the witness so that the witness and
his/her family may be fully protected. However, signed witness depositions
may, if required, be made available to those who require additional data in
order to mount investigations of individual crimes quoted in this report.
The Serbian Council is authorized and ready, given sufficient guarantees,
to make available these depositions to all meritory international
institutions. Also, we have agreement from almost all witnesses, whose
depositions were an important source of data for this report, that they
would be willing to testify on what they saw and lived through before all
international organizations engaged on protecting human rights and before
international courts of law.


With respect,




Academician Pavle Ivic
Serbian Council President

Academician Vasilije Krestic
Serbian Council Information Center Board President

Professor Vojin S. Dabic, Ph.D.
Serbian Council Information Center Director



Report of the Serbian Council Information Center on Harassment and Ethnic
Cleansing in Western Slavonia by the Authorities of the Republic of Croatia


Croatian authorities, far from the eyes of the world public, have initiated
in mid 1991 and have continued to this day their ethnic cleansing of the
Republic of Croatia from ethnic Serb population, so the largest part of
territories controlled by these authorities may be considered as ethnically
cleansed by now. This ethnic cleansing was first conducted in larger urban
areas and in those countryside areas which were inhabited by ethnic Serbs
for centuries and where ethnic Serbs constituted the majority, while ethnic
Croats were a minority or only a relative majority. Later on, areas in
which ethnic Serbs were a minority already were subjected to the same
procedures. In spite of trying, Croatian authorities could not succeed with
their ethnic cleansing only on those territories which subsequently became
parts of the Republic of Serbian Krayina.

The true proportions of ethnic cleansing in the Republic of Croatia will be
possible to determine only if the world community forces the Croatian
authorities to conduct a census under international supervision on
territories they control and if they permit investigations on harassment
and expulsions of ethnic Serbs to take place on those territories. Such
investigations, which would include representatives from organizations
dealing with human rights and representatives of both sides in conflict,
should be conducted in all places where there is founded doubt that ethnic
cleansing took place, since this is the only way to fully expose the
unacceptable practice of harassing members of other ethnic groups, which
cannot be reconciled with Christian morality and is punishable by the
Convention on Preventing and Prosecuting Crimes of Genocide, adopted on the
session of the UN General Assembly on December 9, 1948 in Geneva.

This report deals with ethnic cleansing in western Slavonia because that
was the first area of ex-Yugoslav territory where this practice was begun
and was almost completed, including harand totally brutal ethnic cleansing.
The success achieved by the Croatian authorities in using violence and
feeling of insecurity in ethnic Serbs to ethnically cleanse one of their
strategic and economically speaking most important territories has
encouraged, and continues to encourage, all those who use the same
practices in other ethnically mixed regions of old Yugoslavia. The
procedures of ethnic cleansing in western Slavonia was reconstructed on
basis of written documents, gathered statistical data, polls taken amon

victims of ethnic cleansing and written statements of witnesses of
individual crimes.

According to data as of August 15, 1992, and regarding western Slavonia, 10
city and 183 countryside settlements have been completely ethnically
cleansed of ethnic Serbs, while a further 87 settlements have partially
been ethnically cleansed. New data, gathered on a daily basis by associates
of the Serbian Council Information Center, indicates that the number of
totally and partially ethnically cleansed settlements will soon be much
larger, since Croatian authorities are far from halting the harassment of
ethnic Serbs on territories they control, and on territories under the
protection of UNPROFOR, but subject to the Croatian legal system. We
already have data, albeit in raw form as yet, on several tens of
settlements where ethnic Serbs were a majority or were ethnically mixed,
for which it will soon be reliably known whether they have been completely
or only partially ethnically cleansed.

During the first months of 1991, and until this day, complete ethnic
cleansing was affected in almost all ethnic Serb majority settlement on the
rim of the mountains of Papuk, Psunj, Dilja and Bilogora, all places where
ethnic Croats until this time remained in express minority. By means of
ethnic cleansing of western Slavonia, from Osijek and Vinkovci in the east
to the river Ilova on the west, all of Slavonia has now become an almost
ethnically pure Croat territory. This has to a large extent been the
culmination of a grand project to create an ethnically pure Croat state in
which, as formulated by the Croat state project from XIX century, there is
no place for ethnic Serbian, orthodox population. For it to be completely
realized, in preparation is the final stage of ethnic cleatization of West
ern Slavonia:
certain ethnically completely cleansed but little damaged ethnic Serb
settlements are being settled these days by ethnic Croats from Janjevci
(Kosovo and Metohija, Republic of Serbia). Several hundred of them, who
sold out their properties on Kosovo or have left it to family member use,
have already settled in Miokovicevo, Katinac, Nova Krivaja and Puklica,
recently ethnic Serb settlements. In Zagreb, there are plans to use
financial aid from Europe to construct refugee settlements on the remains
of what were once ethnic Serb settlements.

Croatian authorities were not satisfied to simply drive ethnic Serbs from
their homesteads, but went to, as much as it was possible, to remove all
traces of their centuries long life and cultural existence in those areas -
most churches and other religious buildings belonging to the Serbian
Orthodox Church, including the cathedral and episcopal court in Pakrac,
were looted and either heavily damaged or completely leveled. Almost all
priests of the Serbian Orthodox Church were driven off, while parochial
homes were mostly mined. Because of this, all religious life of ethnic
Serbs has been inhibited to the point where even the deceased cannot be
buried as Orthodox Christians. There are records of harassing the relatives
and all too rare Orthodox priests who remained during religious ceremonies
during burials of deceased ethnic Serbs. For example, on May 9, 1992 in
Podravska Slatina, members of the Croatian National Guard threatened the
local Orthodox priest during the burial ceremony by saying: "Sing, sing,
you won't for long". Murdered ethnic Serbs are, as a rule, buried by
Croatian authorities without the presence of any relatives and in unmarked
graves. The bells of even the small number of remaining Orthodox churches
are now completely dumb.

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