House Destroyed by Explosion in Karlovac

On the night of February 24 at 3:45 a.m. a three-story house was destroyed by a strong detonation. The owner was staying in a nearby house when the explosion happened. A child in a neighboring house sustained injuries requiring stitches to his head, leg, and arm, while around twenty houses in the neighborhood were damaged.

The owners of the house are Croatian Serbs who were living in the Krajina during the war and fled to Belgrade with Operation Storm. In July, Otvorene Oci, Karlovac Committee for Human Rights, and ECMM meet with one member of the family, who had recently returned after obtaining Croatian citizenship through a lawyer in Hungary.

When the woman, co-owner of the house, arrived she found a displaced Croat family living there - the family had been granted the right to live in the house temporarily by the local housing commission. Though the displaced family eventually moved out, the woman was never given permission to move back into her house. The housing commission claimed the house was for someone else. When the displaced family left, they took all the furniture with them. According to the Karlovac Committee for Human Rights, the family had a document stamped by Vesna Kondic, a housing commission representative, allowing them to remove the furniture.

At our initial meeting in July, the owner stated that over 100,000 DEM worth of metal working equipment had been removed by Luka Babic, a local citizen. The Karlovac Committee later told Otvorene Oci, Mr. Babic had permission from Mr. Zaborski, Head of ODPR Karlovac, to remove the tools. The owner had also been questioned by the police and reported that during questioning the police yelled at her, cursed, beat their fists on the table, and questioned her about activities against the state.

Later the day of the explosion, Otvorene Oci visited the house with HHO and the Karlovac Committee for Human Rights. Otvorene Oci spoke with neighbors who were shocked by the incident. One family of refugees from Banja Luka said they would like to leave immediately, but they have no where to go. Another neighbor showed Otvorene Oci the damage to her house, which included blown out front and back windows and frames. Other witnesses to the blast said the police who arrived to investigate the explosion were seen taking tools from the site.

The next day police investigator, Ivan Horvat, met with the owner. According to the owner, Mr. Horvat asked if she had recently experienced any harassment and expressed the police's interest in solving the case.

The women's husband had recently received Croatian citizenship and was about to return from Belgrade. Neighbors reported that another family was also planning to return to an adjacent house.

Otvorene Oci is concerned that this incident may create fear and hinder the return of Serb refugees to their homes. Further, incidents like this could threaten the process of refugees and displaced persons returning to their own homes and lands throughout the Former Yugoslavia.

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