My story: working with refugees in the former Yugoslavia

by Stuart Trist

Stuart Trist is currently Project Manager for the Boys Education Lighthouse Programme. He is based at Curriculum Corporation.

In 1995 I had the exciting opportunity to work as a Delegate of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in the war zone in the former Yugoslavia.

For several years after I left the Victorian Department of Education and Training I had been managing the education programs of the Victorian Red Cross. An important component of this work was developing programs to train Australian Defence Force personnel in international humanitarian law. My background knowledge of the Geneva Conventions and Protocols was essential for work as an ICRC Delegate and my planned mission included work in dissemination of knowledge of the Conventions. In reality, my role involved all the traditional tasks of ICRC Delegates in war zones: visiting and registering prisoners of war, exchanging family messages and civilians across the front lines, assisting organisation of humanitarian relief and, as our highest priority, negotiating respect for the key provisions of the Geneva Conventions.

At different times my area of work included territory held by all sides in the Bosnian conflict, including Sarajevo and the Muslim enclave of Srebrenica.

The following is an extract from my book Refugees in the Australian Issues Collection; it concerns my experiences in humanitarian aid work on the ground in a war zone. It was written in 1998.

My own story

Stuart Trist

On August 7, 1995 almost 25,000 people from the Velika Kladusa area in north-western Bosnia fled from advancing government troops. This was their second move in less than a year. Many left with only their clothes on their backs before joining the human tide of refugees on the road to Croatia.

Only forty kilometres away they were stopped on the road in an area of open countryside that became known as Kuplensko Camp. Surrounded by Croatian soldiers now, they pleaded with the International Red Cross delegates in the area to stay with them for protection.

Some people were travelling in cars and trucks. Many of the farmers had their trusty red tractors and large open farm trailers which were converted into makeshift caravans with plastic sheeting and scraps of wood over the following days and weeks.

A large water tanker was urgently requested by the Red Cross, along with a set of water distribution taps and emergency food packs – a plastic bag with some biscuits, a tin of corned beef and half a loaf of locally baked bread. Blankets and plastic sheeting stored in surrounding local Red Cross branches were requested and brought to the makeshift camp, now with Croatian soldiers manning checkpoints at either end of the seven kilometre stretch of road. Relations between the soldiers and local people and these refugees were very tense.

In the camp the local Red Cross branch of Kladusa was re-established 'in exile' and all people were divided into ten food distribution groups. A makeshift hospital was set up in a roadside restaurant with over one thousand sick and wounded accommodated in surrounding tents.

As the days went by and the group could not move further, the tiny creek along the side of the road became more and more polluted as there was no sanitation system of any kind. Makeshift toilets were built above the fetid stream and the stench and flies filled the air. Because this was such a swampy location, the usual trench latrines would not be a good solution. The people had chosen the wrong place to stop but nothing could be done about it now. The soldiers would not let them move. When it rained the sewerage and rubbish flowed down the hill and into the camp.

Along the roadside the cars and trailers came to look fairly permanent, with plastic tents and shelters built around them, each with washing lines and a smouldering camp fire. Mobs of young men and children wandered up and down the road through the camp. Several more enterprising refugees organised a supply of 'slivo' plum brandy from local farmers, at a huge price, and set up tiny makeshift hotels. These were of the same plastic sheeting and scraps of wood.

What was the solution? These people were the followers of the rebel Muslim leader Fikret Abdic and were fleeing from the Muslim government forces. They were not welcome in the Croatian-held territory in which they found themselves. A solution had to be found before many died of cholera and other diseases.

Extract from Refugees by Stuart Trist from the Australian Issues Collection, editor Jillian Wright, published by McGraw-Hill Australia, Roseville, NSW, 1998, p 29.