Talk:Minefields in Croatia

Wikified/copyedited
I wikified/copyedited this a bit but someone with more knowledge on the subject could expand it. Rasa 14:57, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

conflict of minefields awareness program and tourist industry
the conflict of interests, and the campagn to remove mine warning signs are known and documented. do not remove them, especially with no discussion! Mostssa 08:36, 13 May 2006 (UTC)


 * No original research, no weasel terms, no wild unsourced conspiracy theories etc... --Elephantus 21:48, 13 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Those conspiracy theories look even more funny when You remember that not even one tourist (out of some few dosens millions of them) died from mines after the war. --Ante Perkovic 20:27, 14 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I can see that the article has reached a consensus version. I think the version is OK, have no major objections. It is good to see that the page has been dealt with in constructive way, hope that the same will happen on related tourism page, that I have tried to discuss with other users. Mostssa 10:14, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Croatian tourism industry lobby conspiracy theories
Regarding this vandalism that last a way to long...

The reference given was web address http://www.business-magazin.info/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1570&Itemid=2 so let me translate some text form there:

Croatian:

Državni tajnik za turizam Zdenko Mičić upozorio je na negativnu kampanju Hrvatske kroz jumbo plakate 'Pazi mine', koji su trenutno postavljeni u svim eminentnim trajektnim lukama i na mjestima gdje opasnost od mina ne postoji te je najavio akciju skidanja plakata do početka turističke sezone.

English:

Croatian tourism minister Zdenko Mičić warned on campaign of jumbo - posters regarding mines that can be seen in all ports and in all various places where there are no rwal threat of mines. He announced removing posters before the tourist season.

That's all. So much about "powerful Croatian tourism industry lobby".

To say that tourist industry is at odds with the minefield awareness programme is proposterous because just one dead tourist could ruin a 15- years long posotove development.

I live in Split, Croatia, I'v lived in Split throught entire war and I've never in my entire life seen someone killed in a war. I've never seen a landmine.

It is stupid to put mines warning 100 km from minefield because it just doesn't help anyone. Tourists already knows that we had war here, and they know that mines are somewhere in Croatia, so big mine warning sign on completely wrong place is of no use.

All mine fields are in hinterland, far from hotels and beaches, and they are properly marked and outside of tourist areas. It is important to know that not one tourist died from mines in Croatia after the war, aldo we didn't have stupid jumbo posters all over the place. So, why put it now, and in wrong places?

All this conspiracy theory campaign is led by few people that just hate to see Croatia gainig popularity among tourists. --Ante Perkovic 20:14, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * And you never seen an Ustasha in Croatia either. This picture was from Mars perhaps? The quote obviously confirms what the article says. SrbIzLike 20:35, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
 * So, You openly admit that You are so devoid of arguments about mines that You just had no choice but to change subject to politics? Thanks for proving my point!
 * Now, if You don't have anything to say about minesm please stop vandalising this page. --Ante Perkovic 23:44, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Do not twist my words! I made it clear that the quote confirms what the article said. I can see that in the meantime, the thing has been reformulated - as you could have done. You still keep reverting edits disregarding the content, and that cannot go like that. You people resort to insults, created account with name solely to harrass User:SrblzLike, and revert every Serbian edit. SrbIzLike 02:50, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Oh, my god, this is so funny!!! You people resort to insults, created account with name solely to harrass User:SrblzLike, and revert every Serbian edit.. Hey, I made thousands of edits in last 10 months and You came here 12 days ago!!! And I created account to harrass You. Are You sure that is what You wanted to say??? This is unbelievable :(. --Ante Perkovic 08:09, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * You dont seem to got what I said. I didnt say that your account was created, but that an account whas created impersonating me: User:SrblzLike - this is not my account (there is difference in one letter); it is now banned indefinitely, click on the link and see it yourself! Weather it was created by you or one of your pals I dont know, but it is clear what you people do. SrbIzLike 23:09, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Oh, I see. Yes, You are right, but this wasn't any of my pals (believe it or not). Somewhat longer comment continues on your talk page. --Ante Perkovic 03:38, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I was under the impression that this article was about minefields in Croatia, not about Neonazism or something else? --Elephantus 20:48, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

My view
Since I have been asked to comment, I think that you cannot delete the information just like that. It is against wikipedia policies, since the reference is provided. Things need to be NPOV-ed, not removed. If everyone followed such rules it would be much less strife.

As for the sources provided, they do show: that minister of tourism acted to remove the warning signs. that such signs posted on places like ports were a concern in conection with tourist season. No conspiracy is implied in the source, but it is not claimed in the article that there was a conspiracy either. The warning signs in public places were not there to warn tourists, but citizens who are most of the victims. So, I dont see what is the problem here - maybe in formulation, but you people do not change formulation, you just remove it. Thats not OK. Maayaa 12:48, 16 May 2006 (UTC)


 * "Mines warning signs, part of awareness-campagn, are to be removed by the powerful Croatian tourism industry lobby - implying a conspiracy to deceit, unsourced.
 * "The minefields issue poses a serious image problem for the tourism industry in Croatia," - untrue, unsourced
 * "the industry tries to minimise the negative effects the fear of the mines has on the tourists." - implies that there is a fear of mines, untrue, unsourced. Again implies that the all-powerful "industry" is trying to minimize something - much more than can be read from the source.
 * "This puts the tourist industry at odds with the minefield awareness programme, aimed at saving lives and avoiding injuries which can be serious, like severed limbs." - again, implying that the evil "tourist industry" is indirectly killing people - untrue, unsourced, it should be _strongly_ sourced because it is a serious accusation. Thank you and read WP:NPOV some more, please. --Elephantus 13:15, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Billboards are not mine warning signs!!!
Although this is an exercise in futility, I will state the obvious. As it is clear from the picture that is kept being inserted, these are NOT mine warning signs, but BILLBOARDS otherwiese carrying commercials. MINE WARNING SIGNS ARE NOT REMOVED. Besides they are placed to indicate the areas in their immediate vicinity suspected of being mined! EurowikiJ 13:14, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Reverting without even reading text
I see that Serpen reverted my text without even reading it.

I demand the explanation of deletion of following text (see bolded text):


 * Since 1991, there have been 1,779 casualties reported due to landmines or unexploded ordnance (UXO), out of which 430 died. 'None of them was tourist.

If Serpen and his companions will delete ALL future contribution, ten we will have endless edit-war.

--Ante Perkovic 09:09, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

clarification
The link used as reference under (9) says the following in Croatian:


 * ''Velik interes novinara na nedavno održanom sajmu u Münchenu pobudila je kampanja o opasnosti zaostalih mina u Hrvatskoj, čime je ostavljen loš dojam o Hrvatskoj u inozemstvu obzirom da turističke destinacije nisu minski sumnjiva područja, izvijestio je Mičić. Upozorio je da su tom kampanjom bez obzira na njen humanitarni karakter stvoreni kontraefekti, te se nada da će jumbo plakati koji upozoravaju na minsku opasnost uz turističke prometnice biti uskoro uklonjeni.

''


 * The campaign about the danger of leftover mines in Croatia attracted much attention of journalists at the recent Munich fair, which left a bad impression about Croatia abroad, since tourist destinations are not among the mine suspect areas, said Mičić. He pointed out that the campaign, despite its humanitarian character, has created counter-effects and that he hoped the billboards warning of the danger of mines along tourist roads will soon be removed.


 * Bože....kakve sve bizarnosti moramo pisati zbog opsesivnih velikosrpskih bolesnika. Mir Harven 21:30, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Ajde, malo po malo, sve se da rijesit :). Samo treba malo vise zivaca ;).

I didn't want to engage in endless edit war, so I made 2 changes, 1 by 1. I even didn't delete the part that I found highly POV, but I just put { {fact} } sign for now. I'm open to discussion about "powerfull lobby".

--Ante Perkovic 03:54, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Are you saying that the Croatian Tourism Industry doesn't have a strong lobby? -- serbiana -  talk  03:57, 19 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Of course thay do! Every industry must have some kind of lobby. No disoute about that. But...
 * Having lobby doesn't really mean that you can represent every word someone said like "lobby".
 * "Strong" and "powerfull" are definitly "peacock" words and represent a good example of NPOV. The fact that You can derive from the reference is that croatian minister argued against billboards far from minefields and he has a quite good arguments for it. The "powerefull lobby" is nothing more than your interpretitions.
 * Tell me, can You actually prove that this anything was more than a reasonable request from reasonable minister
 * What would you do if You were him. Imageine for a moment, if possible, that don't wan't Croatia to bunkrupt ;). Imagine tourist going to some of the adriatic island where people didn't even see a soldier since WW2 and there is no mines whatsoever. Would You put billboards on Brac or Hvar also? Does it makes sense? Think about it.
 * --Ante Perkovic 05:50, 19 May 2006 (UTC)


 * There is no need to discuss the "lobby" statement at all until the other side presents some reference for it. Until then, it is slander (unproven accusation), and as such, must be deleted. --Zmaj 06:21, 19 May 2006 (UTC)


 * More to the point, the caption is not the place for that or any other statement. A caption should be short and should describe just the thing shown in the image. It should not be a narrative. The caption is simply not the right place for the "lobby" statement. If you really want to include it, it should go in the main text and it should be cited and verifiable (see WP:CITE and WP:V). I've taken a lot of trouble to make sure that the rest of the article is cited and verifiable - I hope everyone else does the same. -- ChrisO 06:47, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Incorrect figure?
The first paragraph of the Demining Section reads:

"The Croatian government has dedicated itself to eradicating landmines (demining) as well as allowing and assisting a network of international mine clearance programs. It has spent substantial amounts of money on demining work, $24.9 in 1999 alone."

Surely this is an incorrect figure, my suspicion is that the figure is meant to be "$24.9 million", but as I do not have access to the source and due to the extensive vandalism and POV pushing that seems to have occured on this page, I cannot verify this. Can someone who knows what the true figure is please correct it or preferably, update the figure to one from a more recent year. Thanks. Canderra 15:33, 20 May 2006 (UTC)


 * It should have been "million", of course - $24.9 wouldn't have paid for very much... :-) -- ChrisO 15:46, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

New reference
I added a reference to back up the comment on the landmines warning in Travel Guides. It is from the 2000 edition of The Rough Guide to Croatia. This is possibly out of date. So if anyone has got access to the most recent edition, please correct it if appropiate. Regards, E    Asterion  u talking to me? 14:21, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

The Dutch tourist
I explained the whole thing here: Talk:Tourism_in_Croatia. --Zmaj 06:49, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

An interesting article just out
"The Croatian 'bomb bees' that can sniff out landmines from THREE MILES away", by the Daily Mail. Two interesting things in it: 1) using trained bees to locate landmines, 2) some paragraphs clearly "inspired" by this very article in Wikipedia. GregorB (talk) 21:15, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Hm. Interesting one to be sure. I'd prefer to see some more info about the bees, just to make sure that no editor thought of a sensational way to fill in a blank page. And yes, the inspiration for the final part of the text and a callout box (with a map) is clearly from here. Perhaps a backwardscopy is needed to fend off future copyvio claims when one compares a newspaper article and wikiprose.--Tomobe03 (talk) 22:12, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Yeah, the bees are merely interesting, not quite encyclopedic stuff yet (at least as long as they weren't used in actual demining operations). GregorB (talk) 12:39, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

an estimated 921,253 people
surprisingly precise estimation I have to say — Preceding unsigned comment added by K0zka (talk • contribs) 08:32, 27 November 2015 (UTC)

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