Violation of human rights in Yugoslavia poses a threat to peace and the international public

Ljubljana, 3 August - The Council for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and the Slovenian Group of the International Helsinki Federation report in a statement for the public: "As can be inferred from the amply documented newspaper and TV reports from crisis areas in Croatia, especially the Osijek and Vinkovci regions in eastern Slavonia and the region of Sisak in Banija, we are witnessing the events which Europe is facing for the first time since World War II." Military operations in violation of the provisions of art. 57 of the Supplementary protocol I to the Geneva humanitarian conventions are causing large-scale casualties among the civilian population, the statement further says. This filthy war proceeds according to the principle that there must be no survivors, meaning that one side mercilessly kills the captured members of the other side in gross violation of art. 40 of the Geneva humanitarian conventions Supplementary protocol I. The Council for the Protection of Human Rights and the Slovenian Group of the International Helsinki Federation call on the world public, the national and international human rights forums in particular, to demand an immediate and efficient mediation by international organizations towards halting the escalation of genocide and war crimes in the territory of the Republic of Croatia. The Council and the Group are confident that the situation has reached the point where the European Community, the CSCE and the United Nations are entitled to interfere in the internal affairs of Yugoslavia since "the violation of human rights in this state poses a threat to peace and the international public".