Croats Accused Of Genocide Against Serbs

A senior U.S. official accused Croats on Saturday of seriously abusing minority Serbs during and after a summer military offensive to recapture territory.

John Shattuck, assistant secretary of state for human rights, indicated Washington might revoke financial aid and political support if the Croatian government fails to prosecute those responsible for murder and other crimes against Serbs.

Croatian President Franjo Tudjman has dismissed allegations of atrocities committed by his troops, and officials in his office declined comment Saturday on Shattuck’s statements.

International rights groups and European Union monitors have cited numerous cases of murder and intimidation of Serbs and the systematic destruction of thousands of Serb houses by Croatian soldiers during and since an August military offensive.

In the three-day offensive, Croatian forces recaptured much of the territory controlled by Serbs since the country’s 1991 civil war. More than 180,000 Serbs fled. The United Nations estimates that fewer than 2,500 Serbs remain in the recaptured area, known as the Krajina.

“It is a devastated region,” Shattuck told reporters in Zagreb after touring the Krajina. He cited “dramatic evidence” of the burning and looting of homes.

“There (are) also enough eyewitness accounts of bodies … to suggest a large, a very large, number of killings, particularly of elderly people,” he said.

Shattuck said “the climate of impunity” must be brought to an immediate end and said he had told the Croatian government so.

“We are now focusing … on the treatment of Croatian Serbs who have a right to return, against whom major atrocities have been committed,” Shattuck said.

“These abuses need not have occurred on this scale if the Croatian government had taken measures to prevent them, such as arresting and prosecuting the perpetrators,” he added.