Original scientific paper
BASIC DEMOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS OF THE DISPLACED POPULATION FROM THE CROATIAN EAST
Dražen Živić
; Institute for Applied Social Research, Zagreb
Abstract
Although the Croatian East, throughout its long history, has
never been an integral part of Serbia, and Serbs have never
constituted the largest ethnic group in total population, this part of
Croatia became the scene of aggression of Great Serbia, causing
great suffering and tremendous devastation. Tens thousand of
people were forced into exile; mostly Croats, but also Hungarians,
Ruthenians, Ukrainians, Slovaks, and even a small number of Serbs.
During the offensives, and particularly in the course of a five-year
occupation, Serbian aggressor by ethnic cleansing carried out regional
and demographic occupation. According to the records of
July 1,1996, in Croatia were 210,341 displaced persons. The displaced
from the Croatian East accounted for 39.6% (83,322 persons),
and by its total number made up the majority of the Croatian
displaced population. Great-Serbian aggressor has occupied 79%
of the settlements in the Croatian East and expelled from them almost
half of the total pre-war population (43.1 %), mostly Croats
(75,556 persons), Hungarians (3,788), Serbs (1,437), Ruthenians
and Ukrainians (931), and other nationalities (1,610). These data
reveaJ that the Croatian East has been completelyethnically cleansed
of the Croats and for the most part of other non-Serbian population
previously inhabiting the area. Other socio-demographic
characteristics of the displaced population from the Croatian East
mostly do not differ from those established by the 1991 census,
which means that renewal and development of the area cannot
be guaranteed or accomplished without systematic measures of
the state in order to encourage social and economic revitalisation
of the region.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
31674
URI
Publication date:
1.3.1997.
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