U.N. Protests Yugoslav Deportation of Krajina Refugees : Balkans: Serbs sought sanctuary after being routed by Croatian army. But Belgrade has sent many men to Bosnia, where officials fear they will be forced to fight with rebels.

The United Nations protested Monday to the Yugoslav government for its deportation of up to 1,000 military-age men who fled the defeated Krajina region in Croatia but were forced back to Serb-held Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The Croatian Serbs, refugees who escaped with their families to the rump Yugoslavia--made up of Serbia and Montenegro--after the Croatian army overran the rebellious Krajina, are stranded in the Bosnian Serb city of Bijeljina.

They tried to return late last week but were turned back by Yugoslav border guards, said a spokesman with the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

Refugee officials expressed the fear that the men will be press-ganged into the Bosnian Serb army, which is suffering a severe manpower shortage.

The men, most of whom were fighters in the Krajina Serb army, were rounded up from two refugee relocation centers in western Yugoslavia and placed on buses for Serb-held Bosnia, the United Nations said.

Some were taken away by Yugoslav police on the pretext that they were to be given medical examinations, it said.

The U.N. spokesman said the deportation of asylum-seekers is a violation of international humanitarian law. Between 600 and 800 were taken from one area, and 250 were deported in a second group.

“They have clearly expressed their wish to seek asylum in Yugoslavia,” the U.N. official said, adding that a letter of protest was sent Monday to the Yugoslav Foreign Ministry and Belgrade’s refugee agency.

If the men are forced to join the Bosnian Serb army, their deportation will be another example of Belgrade’s cooperation with the separatists who are waging war against the Muslim-led but secular Bosnian government--despite the Yugoslav government’s stated desire to distance itself from the rebels.

As part of his campaign to rejoin the international community and be relieved of punishing economic sanctions, Slobodan Milosevic--president of Serbia, the dominant partner in the rump Yugoslavia--has claimed that his government no longer supports the Bosnian Serbs.

Bosnian Serb leaders had hoped to capitalize on the fall of the secessionist Krajina region by bringing fighters there and their abundant weaponry into the Bosnian Serb army, which is overtaxed in its efforts to control the 70% of Bosnia it has seized.

But the Krajina defense collapsed within hours of the Croatian offensive, and few Krajina fighters now seem willing to join the Bosnian Serb army.

Dozens of the soldiers, interviewed as they crossed into the rump Yugoslavia after relinquishing their weapons at the border, said they wanted no part of the Bosnian Serb cause.

Many were angry that the Bosnian Serbs did not come to their aid.

“The [Krajina] Serbs didn’t defend their own, much less someone else’s real estate,” said Milos Vasic, an independent political analyst and columnist. But, he added, “A lot of them can’t forget [former Bosnian army commander Gen. Ratko] Mladic’s total passivity.”

Elsewhere in the Balkans, evidence continued to mount Monday of abuses, including the murder of civilians, committed by the victorious Croatian army in the reconquered Krajina. There were also additional reports of burning and looting of abandoned Serbian homes.

“The Krajina is literally ablaze,” U.N. spokesman Chris Gunness said from the Croatian capital, Zagreb. “We have lists of villages where as many as 80% of the homes are torched.”

He produced a list of more than 10 villages where he said homes were still being set afire Monday.

Gunness and other U.N. officials have reported seeing the bodies of about 20 men and women in various villages throughout the formerly Serb-held area. Access to many sites is still restricted by the Croatian army.

Croatian President Franjo Tudjman has denied any destruction or atrocities by his troops, a claim that seems to be contradicted by U.N. and human rights investigators.

The International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights said it has detected a clear pattern in the Krajina Serb capital, Knin, of “organized burning and looting after Croatian army and civilian police units moved into the area.”

The Helsinki Federation said a team of its investigators visited a grave site in the Knin cemetery with Croatian officials who told them it contained the bodies of 84 Serbian combatants and of two civilians who died in a hospital.

The burning of homes, slaughtering of livestock and pillaging of possessions are typical steps in the Balkan practice of “ethnic cleansing,” whereby a conquering army drives an entire population from an area and then discourages it from returning.