Nachricht Nummer : 423 Übertragungszeit : 3 min 40 sec Nachricht von : WAM@ZAMIR-ZG.ztn.zer.de (Wam) Antworten an : WAM@ZAMIR-ZG.comlink.de Betrifft : Zagreb Diary on 24 February, 1994 Kopienempfänger : /REG/NEWS/DIARY/WAM, /APC/YUGO/ANTIWAR, /CL/EUROPA/BALKAN, /SOC/CULTURE/BOSNA-HERZGVNA, /SOC/CULTURE/CROATIA, /SOC/CULTURE/YUGOSLAVIA Erstellungsdatum : 25.02.1994 20:27:00 W+1 Zagreb Diary 24 February, 1994 Dobar dan, On the way back from Slavonski Brod yesterday we passed by new HV soldiers training in Pozega. They had to run with their gas mask on along the road to Pakrac, just when we passed by they were allowed to take of their mask and we saw the red faces of very young guys. HV is becoming an army as every other army in Europe, young drafted soldiers training along the open fields. One thing is different they didn't all have the same riffle on the back and this country is still in war, this guys can be send into really active duty. We unload in Pakrac and went further on to Zagreb, on arriving I felt really bad, the cold has got me again. So I went to bed, since in the week of the finishing of ARKzin it makes not much sense waiting until Vesna comes home. Half awake, half asleep I went through the night until the early morning when she finally arrived. I updated her about the situation in Pakrac and she told me how ARKzin is doing. The good news is that the first 10.000 copies run in January has sold over 7.500 around the country and the bad news was that Mercep has started a court case against the magazine. After Globus (for as far as I remember 900.000 DEM) and Feral Tribune he wants to have now 250.000 DEM from ARKzin. The strange thing is that he ask this money for an article which already was published in Danas months, nearly a year ago, and in that time no claim came. All in all neither Vesna, neither me, neither the lawyer of ARKzin are taking this thing rather serious, but you never know. In the morning I felt rather bad, again I had a high temperature and I rather stay in bed for the next days than doing any thing else. But soon afterwards the phone started to ring and also my mailbox was full of messages from the last 3 days so I had to do something before it all went out of control. First thing was to answer at least a part of the messages to show that I am still alive and busy. Next thing to get out of the house and help my friends to train the new volunteers for Pakrac, which arrived in Zagreb yesterday and are full energy to go to Pakrac. Arriving at the peace center there was the old fashion energy going on, in the last two years it really established itself as a middle point of thousand and one activities and the same amount of visitors. In the big room the new volunteers were sitting discussing with eachother one of the question they got to train themselves a bit in nonviolence resolution. Imagine you are at the former front-line and you are a woman, a police guy comes in and asked you to dance and you refuse, since you have no lust to dance with him. He comes up to your table and throws over your beer, what do you do. Listing to the answer I was laughing inside of myself since I know that this thing is simular to what can happen in reality, it actual happened. The answers showed how difficult it is to imagine how life at the front-line really is. After that part it was my turn, since a few months I am doing the historical and political introduction of the war in this area. That sounds a bit strange since I didn't knew almost nothing about this area until I came here two years ago. But my introduction is more an overview from the information I have collected over that period, it was also "the other side" of reality for me, but over the nearly 24 months more and more started to make sense in my head. After that long introduction, I am always surprised that nobody really fall asleep, I had a long meeting with a group of representative from a peace organisation of Austria. They are the group behind the Austria 4 draft resisters who are now working in Pakrac and also in this case I had the feeling that living here is totally different from living abroad. More and more I get surprised that although there must be at least 10 or more good books about what is going on in this area published around the world, people are mostly taking their news out of the normal newspapers, which are not always telling the whole story. I can't say enough that the reality is not black and white and that behind every strong statement or opinion there is another reality which put the original statement or opinion in a total different daylight. From the refugee camp in Savudrija, where Suncokret is working the longest, the message came that 600 of the refugees there refuse to eat the food from the central kitchen, already for more than a week. A local representative of the Croatian Governmental office for Refugees and Displaced People, who visit the camps some days ago stated that there is absolute no reason for the people in the camp to refuse. In the main time the people buy their own food or using the food they get from small organisation from abroad. Also some days ago there was a conference in Geneva of the human rights department of the UN. They discussed the missing people in this area. At this moment there are still 7.600 persons missing from the war in Croatia and in BiH is far over 20.000 people. The relative from f.e. the over 2.000 persons, who are still missing after Vukovar was taken by the troops from the Chetnik and JNA in November 1991 protested some time ago in Zagreb, stating that they had the feeling that the UN is not really taking their losses serious. Mir from somewhere in Hrvatska, Wam ------------------------------------------------------ "Zagreb Diary" can be found on a lot of different electronic networks, it is copyright free and can be ported to any network or other means of communication you like, but please drop my a line, you can reach by sending a message to wam@zamir-zg.comlink.de . Zagreb Diary is dedicated to Tyche, Pjort and Rik, so that they found out what there father have been doing all that time in Zagreb. Financial support for Grassroot relief work in Croatia or BiH can be send to Kollektief Rampenplan (atn. Lylette, Postbox 780, 6130 AN Sittard, Netherlands, tel:. +31-46-524803 and fax: +31-46-516460 or to Zagrebacka Banka, Zagreb, accountnr.: 2440291594, to Kat, Pieter Jan Herman Fredrik, Brace Domany 6 6fl nr3 (postbox 33), 41000 Zagreb. Please notify me if you send or have send any donations. Old numbers can be found by sending a message's with as subject "FILES" to pakrac.info@ZAMIR-ZG.comlink.de, to order a file send a message with subject "SEND " to same address. ## CrossPoint v2.93 ##