Here are millions of euros to cost Balkans war veterans

Recent protests by war veterans in Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina show how states in the former Yugoslavia treat those who fought in the conflicts of the 1990s, remain a very sensitive and often controversial issue.

Therefore, the rights and benefits given to former fighters remain at the core of disputes between veterans and governments of these states, writes Balkan Insight.

Veterans from the 1990s wars in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo and Serbia are determined to receive about 685.8m euros in profits in 2018.

Meanwhile, veterans' associations have gained political influence in some of these countries, many former fighters are still trying to achieve what they see as their fundamental right.

The Kosovo government has earmarked 77.8m euros for former fighters' pensions in 2018 a significant sum in the state budget, which is 1.8 billion euros, but thousands of people are said to have wrongly registered as veterans.

In Croatia, where veterans' associations have managed to have political influence in the state. For them, 174m euros have been allocated to former soldiers, but they are trying to have cries in psychosocial care for those who need to address problems with post-traumatic stress turmoil.

Serbia has earmarked about 114m euros for the care of disabled veterans from the 2018 budget, but its former soldiers complain that the state has not yet adopted a law regulating its official status, almost 20 years since the end of the recent 1990s war.

Authorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina's two political entities, Republika Srpska, the largest populated with Serbs, and the Bosniak and Croatian Federation, dominate the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which they say pays veterans and members of their family 150m to 170m euros annually.