ETHNICALLY CLEANSED SERB VILLAGES BELOW MOUNT VELEBIT NOW HIT BY ECOCIDE

BELGRADE, SEPTEMBER 9 /SRNA/ - The Veritas Documentation - Information Centre warned that the tragic fate of the three Serb villages below Mount Velebit - Divoselo, Čitluk and Počitelj, which were ethnically cleansed and destroyed during the Croatian Medak Pocket military operation during the war, has taken a horrific and shameful turn in peacetime, with the dumping of hazardous waste.

"We call on the public, environmental organisations and international institutions not to turn a blind eye to this peacetime tragedy. The remediation of contaminated land in Divoselo is not merely an environmental issue, but also a matter of basic respect for the victims who perished on this land," the Veritas Centre stressed. Veritas is assessing that the historical and human paradox was complete and terrifying, as the area from which the Serb population was expelled and killed more than three decades ago under the pretext of establishing constitutional and legal order has now, in peacetime, been turned into a dumping ground for European and local hazardous waste. "Where there are no living people left to raise their voices, thousands of tons of poison have been buried, permanently destroying the natural environment of Lika," the Centre warned. The Veritas statement stresses that burying hazardous waste in Divoselo represents the final act in the destruction of the area. "First, the people who had safeguarded Velebit and Lika for centuries were destroyed, and then, in the absence of witnesses, the land itself was poisoned. This environmental catastrophe is a direct consequence of the war and the deliberate neglect of this area, proving that a crime against a region does not end merely with the expulsion of its people, but also with the permanent destruction of their ancestral homeland," the statement said. Veritas pointed out that the demographic vacuum, devastation and absence of people, which were direct consequences of the ethnic cleansing in 1993, were exploited by unscrupulous profit-driven structures and corrupt individuals as a "perfect blank space" for carrying out an unprecedented environmental crime. The statement recalled that the recent official discovery by Croatia's Office suppressing corruption and organised crime – USKOK and expert findings by the Water Management Institute confirmed the existence of an illegal dump containing tens of thousands of tons of hazardous, illegally imported waste on cadastral plots in the completely deserted Divoselo. "The groundwater of this sensitive karst area, which drains toward the Lika River, has been directly contaminated with microplastics, Teflon and extremely hazardous, so-called 'forever chemicals' known as PFAS," the statement said. Thirty-three years have passed since the surprise attack by the Croatian Army on the Serb villages below Velebit - Divoselo, Čitluk and Počitelj, which were under UN protection. During the war, 87 Serbs were killed and the villages were systematically destroyed under a "scorched earth" system. The villages were systematically destroyed and 87 Serbs, including 35 civilians, were brutally killed, while only symbolic sentences were handed down for these crimes, and no one was held accountable for the deaths of women in burned houses. "Today, this area has experienced a complete demographic collapse. Before the war, 780 people lived here, whereas today no one lives in Divoselo, two elderly women live in Počitelj, and only ten residents remain in Čitluk," Veritas noted.