KOZAREV: SERB FAMILIES STILL IN AGONY WAITING FOR ANSWERS

BELGRADE, OCTOBER 7 /SRNA/ - Many families in BiH are still living in agony, unaware of the fate of their loved ones, while the search for missing persons in Croatia and Kosovo and Metohija has stalled because of politicization, Serbian Foreign Ministry Secretary-General Dušan Kozarev said.

Kozarev said there had been a pattern of attempts to erase the Serb presence across parts of BiH, including Sarajevo, the Neretva Valley and parts of Podrinje and Posavina. He said more than 9,500 people were still listed as missing across the former Yugoslavia following the wars of the 1990s, adding that more than 250,000 Serbs had been expelled from Croatia during Operation Storm and that around 1,500 of them were still missing. He also said the fate of many kidnapped and missing Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija remained unresolved. Kozarev said cases such as the alleged organ trafficking linked to the so-called Yellow House, in which the fate of victims remains unresolved even after 28 years, were what he described as clear evidence of selective justice and double standards by the international community. "It is important to bear in mind that no member of the so-called KLA has been held accountable for these crimes," Kozarev said. He said Serbia remained committed to international and regional cooperation aimed at providing answers to families of the missing, as well as to exchanging and verifying information that could help resolve outstanding cases. Kozarev also reminded of the suffering of the Serb people during the First and Second World Wars, particularly in the Independent State of Croatia /NDH/. "Genocide was committed against our people at the Jasenovac camp, where approximately 500,000 Serbs were brutally exterminated by the Ustasha, while the total number of victims reached around 700,000," Kozarev said. The conference was opened by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in a video address, while Ali Naghiyev, chairperson of Azerbaijan's Commission on Prisoners of War, Hostages and Missing Persons, also addressed the official opening ceremony.