Original scientific paper
Expulsion and flight
Pavao Jonjić
; Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
Direct pressure and violence against the non-Serb population began in certain parts of Croatia at the end of 1990 during the so-called “log-revolution”. The situation escalated after direct aggression against Croatia in May 1991, and at that time the first waves of expelled persons began. Serb aggression expanded to Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992. In the beginning mainly women, elderly persons and children fled. They were later joined by men. It is clear that in the beginning an attempt was made to withdraw the helpless population, less capable of resisting aggression. If we examine the mode and the time of flight, we can conclude that at first individuals fled, and later there came to a full-scale exodus. Expelled persons saw the cause of their exodus in organized aggression against them, whereas refugees saw their neighbours as the main cause. The direct stimulus for the exodus, based on answers given by respondents in Croatia, was armed attack on their settlements; whereas for refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina war activity in general was the cause of their flight. Expelled persons from occupied parts of Croatia most often went directly to Zagreb, while refugees (from Bosnia and Herzegovina) most often went to another place at first, and then to Zagreb – or else they passed through a number of stages before they arrived in the Croatian capital. One should note two basic points differentiating expelled persons from occupied parts of Croatia and refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina. First, the flow of expelled persons at the time of our research had practically stopped (except for sporadic expulsion from the “protected areas” controlled by the UN forces), whereas the flow from Bosnia was greatly increasing. The second difference is that expelled persons from occupied parts of Croatia were generally of Croatian ethnicity, while refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina were generally Muslims.
Keywords
expulsion; flight; refugees; expellees
Hrčak ID:
127280
URI
Publication date:
31.12.1992.
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