Bukovica engleski.qxd - Fond za humanitarno pravo

Bukovica engleski.qxd 15.3.2003 13:53 Page 6
6
Bukovica
those in the rest of Montenegro, were mobilized into
the Yugoslav Army (VJ) and, for the first time, a military
command post was set up in Kovačevići. Members of
Bosnian Serb armed units easily crossed the porous
border and both they and the VJ treated the Bukovica
Muslims as the enemy. Muslim homes were searched for
alleged illegal weapons, families were robbed of their
money and valuables, men were beaten and threatened
with death unless they moved out. All this and a number
of murders forced the Bukovica Muslims to flee. In just
two consecutive days, 15 and 16 February 1993, Bosnian
Serb army members took hostage 11 members of the
Bungur family to obtain from them information on the
involvement of Montenegrin Muslims in the Bosnian
Muslim military offensive at Čajniče (Bosnia) on 14 February,
and to exchange them for Bosnian Serbs taken
prisoner. Six elderly male members of the family
returned on 21 March and five others, two women and
three children, were exchanged for two Bosnian Serb
civilians from Goražde on 23 May 1993.
By March 1993, there were 152 displaced Bukovica Muslims
in Pljevlja town. The remaining families left the
area during that year and the next. Hoping that the situation
would soon calm down and make it possible for
them to go back home, some of them moved in with relatives
in Pljevlja. Those who had passports left Montenegro
for third countries. The majority, however,
afraid for their lives and without passports, decided to
go by foot through the woods and forests and cross into
Bosnian Muslim-held territory.
Reporting the abduction of the Bukovica villagers a
few days after the event, the Montenegrin weekly Monitor
strongly suggested that it was part of Belgrade’s
policy of creating an ethnically pure strip of land along
the Montenegrin-Bosnian border. The Montenegrin