These unfortunate events implore us to move with extreme caution regarding American involvement in this conflict. The intentions of the parties involved. now more than ever. call for prudent. not precipitous. judgment. Examples of ethnic cleansing persist in northwest Bosnia according to the U.N. reports based on interviews with refugees before and after the October 12 ceasefire. Assistant Secretary John Shattuck has now gained access into that area. As many as 2.000 men have been separated from the main group of refugees. U.N. officials are trying to determine their fate amid fears that they may have been executed or sent to the front lines as forced slave laborers. The United Nations also reports that during the latest wave of expulsions. Moslems from Bosanski Novi near Banja Luka. were rounded up at the bus station. Draftage men were separated from the rest and were held for 5 days without food or water. The U.N. spokesman in Zagreb reported that many refugees have been given just a few minutes to flee their homes and that girls as young as 17 have reportedly been taken to the woods and raped. Elderly. sick. and very young refugees have been driven to remote areas and forced to walk long distances on unsafe roads and cross rivers without bridges. The United Nations has condemned this barbaric treatment of civilians in the strongest possible terms. According to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. more than 2.000 Moslems and Croats have been forced from their homes since midSeptember in BosnianSerbcontrolled areas. Only about 10.000 are believed to remain. which before the war was home to a half million Moslems and Croats. And what is most distressing is the evidence we have seen of recent atrocities committed by the Serbs after the ceasefire was signed on October 12.
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refugees Refugees