Cordon of despair around lost land keeps UN at bay

FOR TEN days, thousands of Croats, displaced by rebellious Serbs, have barred United Nations traffic from entering or exiting the self-styled 'Serbian Republic of Krajina' in Croatia. Powerless to return to homes abandoned or destroyed during the Serb-Croat war, the refugees have turned the only weapon they have - peaceful protest - against the UN, which they blame for succouring the Krajina Serbs.

'It's a very critical problem, and we deplore the current situation,' said Paul Risley, a UN spokesman in Zagreb. The UN was having trouble resupplying troops, running aid convoys and carrying out other duties, he added. 'If this situation continues and it's clear we no longer have the ability to carry out our jobs . . .we will have some serious decisions to take regarding our presence here.'

Such warnings carry little weight with the refugees. 'We used to live there and Unprofor (UN Protection Force) has done nothing to get us home,' said Zvonko Perak, who was leading some 50 people blockading the UN checkpoint beyond Karlovac, 50km (30 miles) from Zagreb. 'But Unprofor gives (the Serbs) food and fuel and tampons. They eat together and drink together.' Another man, Josip Vrban, added: 'We don't want the UN to fight them, just not to be so friendly.'

Asked who was willing to fight to go home, about half of the 20- odd people standing around said yes. 'We don't know how strong they are militarily but they are not so strong in soul as us,' said Miroslav Butorac who, at 17, is too young to have been drafted yet. 'I would risk death, because I want to go home,' said Draga Bogovic a stout, smiling widow dressed all in black, who now lives in the unfortunately named Gaza refugee camp in Karlovac. 'The Yugoslav army came with tanks and planes to Slunj, we had to leave. I walked from Slunj to Cazin (in Bosnia) and then got a bus to Zagreb.'

But a return home is no more than a dream. A political settlement in Krajina is even more elusive than one in Bosnia, and could come only if Zagreb, Belgrade and Knin (the Serb Krajina 'capital') were forced by the international community to address the status of Krajina; if Zagreb agreed to abandon hope of any military solution and Knin surrendered its dream of joining a 'Greater Serbia', and both worked to dispel their mutual hostility. None of this seems likely to happen, and certainly not before a peaceful resolution to the war in Bosnia.

The further tragedy of Mrs Bogovic and her neighbours is that they appear to be pawns in a power struggle within the Croatian political scene, and between Zagreb and Washington. 'These are poor people. They are totally dependent on the government for financial and even emotional support,' said Slaven Letica, a Zagreb columnist who used to be an adviser to President Franjo Tudjman. He believes the protests are orchestrated by Mr Tudjman's HDZ party. '(Tudjman) has internal problems, so to homogenise his party, he needs to militarise the situation.' A placard stuck on razor-wire at the Karlovac checkpoint reads: 'Unprofor ends on 30.09.94', echoing Zagreb's threat not to renew the UN mandate when it expires in the autumn.