Non-Serb Refugees Living in Serbia

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

One of the weaknesses of the imperial propaganda thesis that the "Serbs are
the most ferocious rapists, ethnic cleansers, and organizers of genocide"
among all the ethnic groups in the Balkan civil war is that the republic of
Serbia has accepted non-Serb Balkan refugees, including Muslims and Croats.
It seems to me that it is a very strange way of cleansing one's republic
ethnically.

Yoshie

*****  REFUGEES
The dismemberment of Yugoslavia, accompanied by a civil war in Croatia and
Bosnia and Herzegovina, generated an exodus of over two million Serbian
refugees who sought shelter in Serbia, Europe and overseas. Some fled to
save their lives and those of their children before the horrors of war,
while others were cruelly driven out of their homes. In Croatia, for
example, ten thousand Serbian houses were blown up, according to the
findings of the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights. Croatia today
is ethnically homogenous, having successfully conducted the largest ethnic
cleansing of the Yugoslav crisis, reducing the Serbian population there
from 650.000 to 100.000 people.

Currently, 705.667 refugees are living in Serbia. 451.124 were registered
from May 1991 to July 1995, and 254.498 from August to December 1995. About
12% are not Serbs, but Muslims, Croats, and members of other ethnic groups.
About 90% are staying with families, relatives and friends, and only about
10% in 700 collective centers in Serbia. The majority live in poverty, on
insufficient domestic budget of their hosts and state aid. The
international community seems to have turned a deaf ear to the needs of
these refugees who have found temporary shelter in Serbia.
<http://www.serbia-info.com/facts/refugees.html>  *****

Yoshie