Until present, 9,000 people have contacted the office providing information and free legal aid to Serbs who own property in the Federation of BiH, and the same number of cases have been initiated for the exercise of property rights covering a total area of about 57,000 hectares, said the Director of the Diaspora Directorate, Arnaud Gouillon.

Gouillon reminded that 541,000 Serbs had lived in the FBiH until 1991, and today they were about 56,000.

– About 400,000 displaced persons and refugees have the right to property, but due to the current harmonization of land register and cadaster in the FBiH, they are at risk of losing that right. Therefore, a little over a year ago, we launched a campaign to inform the Serbs expelled from the FBiH about their property rights, and that is a long process – said Gouillon.

Reminding that the position of Serbs differed among the countries of the region and that it was not the same to be a Serb in Ljubljana and in Glamoč, Gouillon said that the Directorate was monitoring each country separately and had a list of unresolved issues of importance for the Serbian people.

– The point in common is that the Serbian people is autochthonous in all the countries of the region, that it has lived there since ancient times – emphasized Gouillon.