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(Refugees of)The wars in former Yugoslavia Printable Version PRINTABLE VERSION
by SLOVENC, Slovenia Aug 16, 2004
Peace & Conflict , Refugee Rights   Opinions

  

It has been 13 years since my country became independent and the war was started. It all began in June 1991; Slovenia was the 1st Yugoslav country to proclaim independence, immediately followed by Croatia. The JNA attacked both, but many say that due to a homogeneous army Slovenia won the war in 10 days.

A bit different was the situation in Croatia where the army was mixed and really close to the JNA. The JNA consisted of Croatians, Muslim Bosnians, Serbs, Montenegrins and Macedonians. The Slovenes left the army soon after the 1st ever democratic elections in a socialistic country - Slovenia. So we had a small but efficient army.

However let's return to the situation in Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Kosovo and Serbia. All the 3 republics where the war lasted a longer time, had programs for ethnic cleansing. This was really bad, because there was no unity, like in Slovenia. So everyone killed their neighbor who wasn't the same nationality. The worst programs were by Croatia and Serbia, not just that they wanted to remove other nations from their territories; they also wanted to remove the other 2 nations in B&H. The biggest crisis areas were at the Serbo-Croatian border, and of course in Bosnia and Herzegovina which is still divided into the Serb republic and the Bosnian federation (Muslim Bosnians, Croatians).

During the war about 70 000 refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina fled to Slovenia, but there were also the Croatian refugees. So the number is not precisely known (about 75 000 or a bit more). Then happily Slovenia and some other European countries, sent their troops to establish peace, they have somehow succeed however there still are many armed forces in BIH. This was the first major wave of refugees; the next one came in the late 90's, when the Americans have attacked Serbia and its two autonomous regions of Vojvodina and Kosovo. This happened because of a similar reason as in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The reason was ethnic cleaning in Kosovo. It was led by one the man that also led it in Bosnia - by Slobodan Milosevic.

As you know the inhabitants of Kosovo are ethnic Serbs and ethnic Albanians. So Milosevic wanted to get rid of the Albanians, and started a similar project as some years ago with Franjo Tuðman in B&H. Personally I think that the ethnic cleaning could be stopped without a war! But the Americans have to show the world how important they are, by making the world peace come in danger! So they attacked, it was one of the biggest mistakes done by the US, and again they have proven that they haven't got any ideas what the reason for attacking was, of course they have solved the crisis a bit, by making them the most hated nation in Serbia, so that they forgot a bit about the Albanians, but on the other way they made the situation even worse!

Thousands of refugees have fled to the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, to Albania, Montenegro and other states. These refugees caused mayor problems to FYR of Macedonia, where a crisis started! The war was still going on the Americans were still bombing the republic and then finally, they found Milosevic. So the Americans could stop terrorizing the country! Serbia immediately came into a huge financial crisis; the war brought a lot of poverty, victims, and refugees who were slowly returning back to their homes. Again many countries have brought their forces to Kosovo, but even though the hate between both nations there is still strong and there are still conflicts going on. Well the Kosovar people will probably decide next year, whether proclaim an independent country or not. Well I hope that this won't bring even more conflicts to the region as Montenegro will with a huge chance also held a referendum about their independence. So it is only a matter of years till the former Yugoslavia will totally brake up.





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