6 August 1997
Dear Sir or Madam:

We turn to you with the request for support and help for
the Muslim people of Sanjak, a predominantly Muslim area
close to the border of Bosnia-Hercegovina divided
between Serbia and Montenegro. The Helsinki Committee
of Sanjak is afraid of a new exodus of the Muslims from this
area after their human and civil rights have been gravely
disrespected over the last three weeks.

On 11 July 1997, the Milosevic regime has dismissed the
Muslim-led local government of Sanjak's capital Novi Pazar
and replaced it by members of Milosevic's Socialist Party
and his wife's Yugoslav United Left (YUL). Sanjak's
representative in the Yugoslav federal parliament, the Party
of Democratic Action's (SDA) president in Sanjak,
Suleyman Uglyanin, was stripped of his mandate and legal
proceedings were launched against him for violating
Yugoslavia's territorial integrity. Accusations of "violation
of territorial integrity" are used by the Serbian regime to
criminalize and harrass representatives of national
minorities in Serbia.

In the local elections of 3 November 1996, a joint list of
Muslim parties won the majority in the city councils of
Sanjak's capital Novi Pazar, in Sjenica and Tutin, as well as
one seat in the federal parliament which was taken by SDA
president in Sanjak, Suleyman Uglyanin. The victory of the
joint Muslim list in the elections gave the people hope that
the situation would improve and bring more tolerance and
respect to the minorities in Serbia.

According to local eyewitnesses, the people feel again like
living under state of emergency. They are frightened and
feel depressed because heavy police forces are supervising
every move and entry to the city of Novi Pazar.

About 440,000 people live in the relatively small area of
Sanjak, 250,000 in Serbia and 190,000 in Montenegro. An
estimated 226,600 or 51,5 percent (according to the
Belgrade authorities), resp. 330,000 or 75 percent of the
total population (according to the Muslim party SDA) are
Muslims. During the war in neighboring Bosnia-
Hercegovina, Serbian troops and militia attacked also
Muslim villages in Sanjak close to the Bosnian border.
Serbian radicals from Serbia and Bosnia used the Sanjak
area as a hinterland where they withdrew from fighting in
Bosnia, terrorizing the local population. Up to 80,000
Muslims (according to UN special rapporteur Elisabeth
Rehn) sought shelter in other parts of the country or
abroad. Around 5,000 Muslims were forcibly expelled from
the villages around Severin and Bukovica close to the
Bosnian border. The empty houses were looted and then
burnt or mined to prevent the owners from returning.

Between November 1993 and February 1994, Serbian police carried
out raids in at least 400 Muslim families and arrested hundreds
of people under the pretext that they possessed illegal
weapons. Those arrested were tortured in detention. Almost the
entire leadership of the Muslim party SDA in Sanjak was
entenced to terms of imprisonment of one year or longer on the
base of accusations of organizing armed rebellion.

Discrimination and harrassment, as well as bomb attacks against
mosques, houses and stores still belong to everyday life of the
Muslim community in Serbia. Many people feel shocked and
depressed about the fact that their local government was so
easily dismissed by the Serbian regime. Analysts of the Serbian
opposition say that this was only the beginning of growing
ethnic tensions in Sanjak incited by president Slobodan
Milosevic's efforts to present himself as a man of law and
order in view of the forthcoming parliamentary elections on 21
September.

We would like to ask you to help the people of Sanjak.
Please demand from the Serbian government that the Muslim-led
local government of Novi Pazar be re-installed into office and
that the politically motivated indictment against
Suleyman Uglyanin, the Muslim deputate of Sanjak in the
Yugoslavian federal parliament, be stopped. Please show the
Serbian regime that its rule of power instead of law does
not pass unnoticed by the international public and that it does
not find your approval.

Please write to the governments of the United States, Great
Britain, Germany, to the president of the European Council,
Luxemburg's prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker, and
to the influential representative of the American parliamentary
opposition, US senator Jesse Helms. Express your concern about
the Milosevic regime's dismissal of the legal Muslim government
in the city of Novi Pazar, which incites new
ethnically motivated tensions in Sanjak and a new wave of
repression and discrimination against the Muslim
minority in Serbia, and demand that the Serbian government be
urged to re-install the legal government of Novi Pazar.

Sincerely yours

Tilman Zuelch, President

Addresses:

Slobodan Milosevic, President of the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia, Andricev venac 1, 11000 Belgrade,
Yugoslavia, Fax: +381-11-656-862
Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, Main State Building ,
2201 C Street NW, Washington DC 20520,
U.S.A., Fax 001 202 224 2417
Senator Jesse Helms, 403 Dirksen , Senate Office Building,
Washington DC 20510, U.S.A., Fax 001 202 228 1339
Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Minister Robin Cook, King
Charles Street , GB - London SW 1A 2AH, Fax 0044 171 839 2417
Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs Klaus Kinkel, Postfach
1148, D - 53113 Bonn , Fax +49 228 17 3402
President of the European Council, Prime Minister Jean-Claude
Juncker, Présidence du Gouvernement,  4, rue de la
Congrégation, L - 2910 Luxemburg, Fax +352 461 720