CAST ASIDE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26631, 29 November 1947, Page 6

CAST ASIDE

DISPLACED PERSONS DESPERATE PLIGHT IN YUGOSLAVIA The plight of displaced persons, *• mainly grandmothers and children." who, it is alleged, are being turned out of Yugoslavia because they cannot work, is described in a letter received in Dunedin from a New Zealander, a former UNRRA officer, now in charge of a camp for displaced persons m Austria. “ I think I have the most interesting camp of the lot in Strass, which is the quarantine camp for the Volksdeutsch. who are being turned out of Yugoslavia and Hungary,” the letter states. “Till I came here I had no real idea of what had been happening in this part of the world in the last three years. We get in about 500 people per week—nearly all women and children and old men—all of whom have been in Yugoslav work camps for the past three years and are in a terrible state of malnutrition. Some of the children are so weak that they can hardly walk, and the kindergarten is a miserable sight; they all seem to• be suffering from malaria, anaemia, or both. VVeeding-out Process “ Just now,” the letter continues, “ Tito seems to be weeding out all the non-workers, collecting them in one camp, and pushing them over the border; in the early part of this month our intake suddenly shot up to over 1000 per week, and mostly grandmothers and young children at that. The men were usually in the German Army, so when the Russians came m the women and any remaining young boys were taken off to Russia for forced labour. As a result, families are broken up, and part bf my job is to take particulars of missing relatives and forward them on to the Red Cross. “ Clothing is a hopeless job,” the writer says. “If I emptied my store in one day there would still be people going round in rags, as no one has had any replacements for three years. Fortunately, we have a small supplementary food store which we use for giving a little extra to children, hospital patients, etc., and it is satisfactory to see what; quick improvement they can make in even a few days with a little good food. I had one 14-year-old child who put on 2£ kilos in 10 days. She still looked a scarecrow, but was beginning to appear more human. Need for Aid

“ I am trying hard,” the letter concludes “to stir up the Council of British Societies for Relief Abroad to do more publicity in the dominions, as the British Red Cross has left here now, and our supplies have been cut by more than half. I feel sure that if only 1 people in New Zealand, for example, knew how bad things were among these people they would do something about it. Most of them come from the area which was Aus-tria-Hungary till 1918, and they were all turned off their lands at the end of 1944. The Hungarian Volksdeutsch are only now being turned out, and the contrast between them and those from Yugoslavia is amazing, as the former come with all their household goods and look amazingly well clothed and fit by contrast. Even prisoners of war returning from Russia look robust and well clothed in comparison with those from the Yugoslav camps.