The United Nations is handing control of Eastern Slavonia back to Croatia, the last of its territory lost to rebel Croat Serbs during the war in the former Yugoslavia.

UNHCR spokesman, Kris Janowoski: "nervousness about the transition" Dur 2' 49"

The handover ceremony on Thursday is in the main town in the region, Vukovar, which saw bitter fighting at the beginning of the war in 1991.

A Croatian government spokesman said the handover was a victory reached without bloodshed. But a spokesman for the Croatian Serbs said his people now faced a period of uncertainty.

Vukovar was seized by Serbs in 1991 a four-month siege

The UN, which has administered the region for the past two years, said it had done its best to ensure that all ethnic groups received equal treatment once Croatia resumed control.

A 200-strong international monitoring mission has been deployed to protect Serbs who choose to stay and to supervise the orderly return of thousands of mainly non-Serb refugees.

Some 80,000 Croats were driven from Eastern Slavonia when it was captured by the Serbs and tens of thousands of Serbs flocked to the region in 1995 to escape Croatian army offensives against other former Serb-held areas.

UNHCR spokesman, Kris Janowoski

A spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Kris Janowski, said there had been concerns about the handover, but there had been no exodus of Serbs from Eastern Slavonia as expected.

"Most of the Serbs remain in Eastern Slavonia and their own leaders are urging them to stay and trust the Croatian government. The onus is on the Croatian government. We have to see if the Croatians keep all their promises and fulfill the agreements they made."

According to UN estimates, the cost of reconstruction in Eastern Slavonia will be $1.2bn. But the region also has rich farmland, oil fields, direct access to the Danube and control over international road and rail links.
 

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