In My Opinion

The uncontested and unprincipled campaign over the past few months against the Helsinki Human Rights Committee in Serbia just illustrates the inability of this environment to undertake a truly democratic dialogue as a precondition to initiate democratization and create an open society.

That is especially evident lately when the press and public figures are making statements with recognizable divisions for or against the Dayton agreement; that is true of political parties and non-governmental organizations in Serbia, anti-war, anti-nationalist and civic-democracy oriented organizations who were all on the same side during the war - opposing it, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, advocating peace and human rights, and peace in Bosnia and preserving it as a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-confessional state.

That division is unnatural and wrong and the dilemma is false and insupportable bearing in mind the common denominator of motives and stands in these groups during the war. The logical and natural assumption is that the people who stress critical views of the Dayton agreement can't be against it as a whole and completely deny its significance and role because, as some of them say, it stopped the bloody years of war.

The peace agreement which the international community managed to impose, although unfortunately late, was achieved when ethnic cleansing was completed and the gap of inter-ethnic mistrust and intolerance was deep. That reality has to be faced with efforts to get everything positive possible out of the Dayton agreement. Advocates of an efficient implementation of the agreement, in a way which would be in the interest of the peoples of Bosnia, know that the agreement is ambivalent - it contains both a positive integrational, and a negative disintegrational potential, and political action has to be led by that. Ljubivoje Acimovic, a member of the Helsinki Committee, wrote probably the best analysis of that in Nasa Borba last December titled the "Dayton Crossroads". Taking it as a starting point, the Helsinki Committee opted for a constructive approach especially in parts of the agreement on refugees and cooperation with the Hague Tribunal. We also believe that political pressure, both international and domestic, should be focused in that direction.

Since the refugees are the most numerous victims of the war it is only natural to resolve their position through the active engagement of non-governmental agencies on human rights. There should be no disagreement on certain issues forcing people who are trying to contribute to resolving the problem to face biased criticism and a denial of what they are doing.

However small the final effect of these efforts for the refugees, an active attitude and engagement by people and organizations in this environment are important, the more so if they can make a specific contribution. The Helsinki Committee feels its efforts are constructive, not just a moral obligation, because of the fact that over 32,000 refugees from Croatia voluntarily registered with the Committee to return home.

I need to stress that the FRY regime has not adopted a comprehensive policy on refugees and cooperation with the tribunal yet - which creates misunderstandings and differences. The ambivalence of the regime on the refugee issue will be primarily at the expense of the refugees, both the ones in the FRY and new ones from Eastern Slavonia and perhaps the RS. The opposition has also made no clear stand on those issues.

Those are key issues for the political situation in Serbia. On the other hand, the constant avoidance of facing reality and the defeat of nationalist policies show that ambitions still exist in regard to the national program but somewhat more modest now. In that sense the refugees are there to consolidate ethnically pure territories by moving, mainly the Krajina Serbs into parts of the RS. At the same time, cooperation with the tribunal is being made into a constant problem because it inevitably establishes responsibility for crimes and the criminal character of ethnically pure creations. It's understandable why the regime has that attitude on those two issues.

However, the impression is that a wide national consensus is being formulated on the issues with the intention of dividing Bosnia as the final solution to the Serb national question. Also, the division of Bosnia provides an amnesty for war crimes because it verifies the theory that this was a civil war and that all sides are equally responsible.

Instead of focusing on criticism and arguments, it would be in the common interest to focus on joining forces by everyone who favorably declares a unitary Bosnia in exerting pressure to force the implementation of the peace agreement to secure a single Bosnia.