Toll of Bosnian Rape and Death Camps Increases Steadily

By Susan Bloor

In the first two years of war and "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia, approximately eight percent of Muslim Bosnian women were raped by Serbs, according to a statistical study done by BISER, the International Initiative of Women from Bosnia-Herzegovina. Nor, despite their fading from the headlines, have either the ''rape camps" or the death camps in Serbian-held Bosnia been shut down.

A recent Washington Post article entitled "U.N. Forces Accused of Using Serb-Run Brothel" quoted women survivors of a rape camp named "Hotel Sonja" who reported that "most of the women held there were killed after they had been raped." Such charges are not unusual. Clearly many of the women in Bosnia-Herzegovina who are raped by Serbs are later murdered, or die due to the injuries they have sustained.

The same article reported charges of involvement by U.N. troops in the systematic rape of Bosnian women. "Two. . . women told Newsday they had been raped at the brothel, one by a U.N. officer, one by a Bosnian Serb soldier," correspondent Roy Gutman wrote. "Every one of a dozen Muslim witnesses to the purported U.N. visits to Sonja's stated his or her strong belief that members of the U.N. Protection Force had joined in the sexual abuse of women detainees. "

Members of women's groups based in Croatia and in the United States have long been aware of this reality. They have spoken directly to survivors who were either raped by U.N. soldiers while in captivity or who witnessed U.N. soldiers' participation. Even Gutman's report of U.N. troop participation in the sexual abuse committed at Sonja's mistakenly called it a ''brothel," implying that the women are there voluntarily or are being paid. Prostitution does, of course, exist in war zones, but this is not prostitution. It can only be called torture and murder.

Unfortunately the dearth of recent coverage of rape camps and death camps in Serbian-occupied areas has lulled the public into believing such camps no longer exist. This couldn't be further from the truth. The Kareta Feminist Group in the Croatian capital of Zagreb reports that many of the rape camps that earlier had been disbanded after they were discovered by journalists have reopened, and that atrocities continue against women and girls. Inmates of some rape camps that were closed were forced at gunpoint to walk to other areas where the camps reopened. They were the fortunate ones. Sometimes, Kareta said, the women held in a camp were killed when the camp was closed.

According to BISER, approximately 20 percent of Bosnia's Muslim population has been killed, and 50 percent of all Bosnia's Muslims have been expelled from their homes. Because the war continues, these figures continue to rise.

Women and children account for about 85 percent of the refugee population coming out of Bosnia. The majority of the Bosnian Muslim refugees have streamed into neighboring Croatia where, unfortunately, their troubles do not end.

Croatia is a country of 4.76 million struggling to deal with a refugee population that is estimated at close to half a million people. Many of these people are internal refugees, and many, out of fear of deportation, remain undocumented.

Amnesty International estimates conservatively that about 30,000 mainly Muslim Bosnian refugees in Croatia are not registered there. High unemployment, runaway inflation, and a rising crime rate all plague war-weary Croatia, whose people increasingly blame their economic and social ills on the unwelcome newcomers. Bosnian Muslims are by far the worst treated among the refugees.

Despite "official" government policies to the contrary, Muslim refugees are offered much lower quality housing than Croatian refugees. In the coastal town of Split, Croatian refugees are often housed in seafront hotels, while Muslims are placed in barracks with dirt floors and no running water. There also are reports of Croatian doctors and hospitals refusing to treat Muslims.

Refugee women, all of whom are dealing with trauma, have virtually no access to psychiatric or psychological help. Public education is reserved only for Croatians, and yet the Croatians complain when Muslims in the desolate refugee camps initiate religious education among themselves.

Crowded conditions in the camps promote disease and magnify despair. Currently, there is a yellow fever epidemic in the camps around Split.

Unfortunately, speaking out against the poor treatment of refugees in Croatia is often equated with betrayal. Recently, several Croatian women were branded "witches" by the Croatian press after they expressed exhaustion and disgust with the war.

One of these "witches" is Slavenka Drakulic, a well-known journalist and novelist whose books on the war have offered an alternative view to the predictably militaristic line of the Croatian government. Another is Vesna Kesic, a feminist, whose organization, the Center for Women War Victims, has formed support groups in Zagreb for Bosnian and Croatian women refugees.

During a recent speech in Washington, DC, Kesic admitted that although she would like to see more interaction between Muslim and Croat women, the reality is that these women often refuse to talk to one another. Kesic maintains, however, that women's groups in Croatia, Bosnia and Serbia continue to communicate with one another and remain some of the last vestiges of hope for eventual reconciliation between the warring countries.

Among U.S. organizations seeking to help women in the former Yugoslavia is Women for Women in Bosnia, of Washington, DC. It matches Bosnian Muslim and Bosnian Croat women with U.S. women sponsors, who send letters and a monthly $20 donation directly to the women they sponsor. The funds help provide basic necessities, and the accompanying letters from U.S. sponsors lay the foundation for lasting friendships and provide emotional support to women who have virtually no access to professional psychiatric care.

Such private organizations, however, cannot provide the long-term developmental aid needed for future regional stability. Only governments can provide the massive financial and diplomatic support necessary to revive devastated Bosnia and Croatia, while maneuvering for a political solution by maintaining an embargo on Serbia to pressure it into negotiations. Ultimately, elected officials in the U.S. and Europe must assume their responsibilities for implementing long-term solutions to halt the genocide that presently is overwhelming humanitarian efforts to help the hundreds of thousands of victims.

Susan Bloor is vice-president of Women For Women in Bosnia, 1212 New York Ave. NW, #300, Washington, DC20005, (703) 352-3047 She lived in Croatia in 1990 and 1991.