Zvonko Milas – Croatia, the War, and the Future

Croatian Parliament Declaration On Position of Croats In Bosnia and Herzegovina

December 16, 2018 by inavukic 7 Comments

From Left:Zvonko Milas, State Secretary, Central Office for Croats living outside Croatia,
Zeljko Glasnovic, Member of Croatian Parliament for the diaspora,
Gordan Jandrokovic, Speaker of Croatian Parliament,
Marija Pejcinovic Buric, Minister for Foreign and European Affairs
Photo: Pixsell

The Croatian Parliament has Friday 14 December 2018 adopted the proposed Declaration on the Position of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) (PDF Declaration). Votes for were 81, against 11 and abstaining 4. Hence, the desired consensus was not reached, which leaves space for ongoing political manipulation and set backs in the lobbying for strengthening of the power in decision making as far as Croat role is concerned there. Issues that stand out particularly relate to the need to change BiH Electoral Act so that Croats are given the prerogative to vote for their own representatives in Presidency and parliament and those relating to the full and deserved status and recognition of the 1990’s war forces Croatian Defence Council (HVO).

Advocating strongly for equality of Croatian people in that country the Declaration (Link for PDF version of the Declaration and Amendments)calls for changes to the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina and its Electoral Act. It states that “The Croatian people in Bosnia and Herzegovina are a part of one and indivisible Croatian nation, regardless in which country and in which part of the world members of that nation live.”

In its ascent to parliamentary vote the proposed Declaration had given rise to numerous criticisms from the opposition, particularly Social Democrats, who held that it represented meddling in another country’s internal affairs. Accordingly, the original text discussed in parliament on 12 December has partly been changed.

Croatian people of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) are standing on the fence of their survival. Their status as equal people to Bosniaks and Serbs in BiH is continually eroded to the point that, despite protests and attempts to change the Electoral law, their representative in the Presidency of BiH is elected by the Bosniaks. Without a doubt, and based on jurisdiction installed within the 1995 Dayton Agreement and subsequently in the Constitution of BiH, Croatia has an obligation in protecting the constituency, equality and interests of the Croatian people in BiH. Hence, given the developments since 1995 that saw increasing deterioration in the status of Croats in BiH that places their very existence there in jeopardy, the time has arrived when Croatia has no alternative but to formulate its clear political framework that would help achieve and sustain such paramount rights of Croatian people in BiH.

To say that the debate in the Croatian parliament on Wednesday 12 December 2018 on the proposed Croatian Parliament Declaration on the Position of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina was heated would be a monumental understatement. Not only was the debate that lasted some ten hours into the night heated but it clearly demonstrated the fact that a Croatian parliamentary consensus on the Declaration was almost impossible to achieve. The bottom line to the disparity on whether the Croatian parliament should pass such a declaration lies in the evidently irreconcilable views between the governing majority and parts of the opposition on the role Croatia should play when it comes to its direct stand ad activities regarding Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The “liberal” opposition headed by Social Democrats (former communist league of Yugoslavia) considers the declaration to be damaging and an encroachment into internal political affairs of a neighbouring country while another portion of the opposition, e.g. Hrvoje Zekanovic/HRAST who vied for a third entity (Croatian) in BiH, Zeljko Glasnovic/the MP for the Croatian diaspora who especially emphasised the need to cement the recognition of the Croatian Defence Council (HVO) which was instrumental in protecting the borders of Croatia during the 1990’s war, considers that the proposed text is lukewarm and demands more concrete solutions favouring the protection of Croats within BiH. Proposed by the Parliamentary Committee for Croats Living Outside Croatia and the ruling Croatian Democratic Union the Declaration seeks to strengthen the position on Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina; to preserve the political subjectivity of the Croatian people in Bosnia and Herzegovina particularly because of geostrategic influences being a first class strategic Croatian state and national interest.

The Declaration warns of marginalisation of the Croatian people in BiH and calls for changes to the Constitution and Electoral Act of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Declaration, of course, would have no direct power to make constitutional reforms in Bosnia and Herzegovina but a consensus on such a political framework would have been likely to strengthen advocacy for major positive changes that would enable the equality of the Croatian people in BiH.

The Croatian Minister for Foreign and European Affairs Marija Pejcinovic Buric rejected criticism by the opposition that the declaration encroaches on internal political affairs in the neighbouring country. “The Republic of Croatia is only asking for the Dayton Agreement to be respected along with constitutional decisions by the Constitutional Court in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” said Pejcinovic Buric.

While the Declaration would not be binding for Croatia or Bosnia and Herzegovina, the BiH presidency in Sarajevo (for which the Croat representive Zeljko Komsic was recently voted in by majority Bosniak/Muslim vote) already views it as another attack on Bosnia’s sovereignty after the two countries became involved in a previous dispute about the Bosnian general elections in October.

In its current form the Declaration does claim that the election of Zeljko Komsic as the Croat member of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency at October’s polls was not in line with the Dayton peace agreement that ended the 1992-95 Bosnian war because Komsic was elected mostly by Bosniak votes, not by those of Bosnian Croats.

“For the successful functioning of Bosnia at all its levels it is essential that all its constituent peoples [Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs] and citizens be equal, to trust and believe in Bosnia’s future,” the declaration says.

With this declaration the Croatian Parliament seeks, among other things, from the appropriate institutions in the Republic of Croatia the following:

In order to realise the constitutional, legal and strategic documents and the international obligations of the Republic of Croatia in relation to Croats in BiH and towards BiH:

– that the Republic of Croatia, as a signatory and guarantor of the Washington and Dayton Agreements, and a member of the Peace Implementation Council in BiH, report to the UN Security Council and the PIC Steering Board members that the imposed amendments to the Entity Laws and the imposed changes to the Election the Dayton Peace Agreement was severely violated. Since the balance between the constitutional position and the rights of the constituent peoples in BiH at the expense of the Croatian people, but also to the detriment of the stability and functionality of BiH, the Croatian Parliament charges the representatives of the Republic of Croatia to seek before the international organisations responsible for implementing the Dayton Peace Agreement respect for the Dayton Peace Accords and that the imposed changes be removed via changes to the Constitution and the Election Law of BiH;

– that the Republic of Croatia, as a member of the Peace Implementation Council and as a member of NATO and EU in multilateral and bilateral capacities, advocates and supports the urgent changes of the Constitution and the Election Law of BiH, which would lead to the harmonisation and standardisation of the equal constitutional position of the three constituent peoples in BiH, in an institutional and administrative territorial view;

– the appropriate institutions of the Republic of Croatia are invited to increase their assistance to institutions of education, health, culture, media and Catholic Church institutions in BiH;

– to include institutions of strategic importance for Croats in BiH in the form of financial assistance from the Republic of Croatia, with full respect for their program and personnel independence and the principles of project business aimed at realising real needs and solving specific problems;

– to establish financial instruments for investment in development and employment in the majority Croatian areas, in areas where Croats lived in significant numbers before the war and from which they were forcefully deported or displaced and thus prevent departure and support the return of deported Croats to BiH;

– to stimulate new investments of Croatian companies operating and investing in BiH, especially in places with the Croat majority, where the number of Croats has been drastically reduced due to the war, due to the discriminatory policy of national majority in the Entities and counties on whose territory they are, their access to employment is disabled;

– to encourage cooperation with all local, county and state entities and representatives of the Republic of Croatia who have experience in using funds from European and other programs in the design of future projects and cross-border cooperation that would respond to the real needs of all media in BiH, especially in the areas of to which economic, scientific, academic, cultural and other subjects fulfilling the needs of Croats have capacities for the purposeful and efficient use of available resources, but also in areas where parts of the Croatian people are in a state of inadequate meeting of the needs in these areas;

– to fully valorise the role of the Croatian Defence Council (HVO) in the defense of the Republic of Croatia and the Croatian territories in BiH, but also in the preservation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the whole of BiH, and to support the resolution of the status and the existential questions relating to the defence population, especially the disabled and the victims of the Homeland War;

– to give equality to Croatians outside Croatia in exercising their right to vote with other citizens of the Republic of Croatia in accordance with the Constitution of the Republic of Croatia, by introducing postal, preferably electronic voting, and by considering harmonisation of the number of representatives representing Croats outside the Republic of Croatia with the proportion of that population in the total number of voters.
Ina Vukic

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Croatian Defence Council, Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Declaration on the position of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Gordan Jandrokovic, Hrvoje Zekanovic, HVO, Marija Pejcinovic Buric, Zeljko Glasnovic, Zvonko Milas

Croatian Diaspora On Agenda – Most Parliamentarians Busy Bunking

October 22, 2017 by inavukic 11 Comments

Zvonko Milas
State Secretary, Office for Croats living outside Croatia
Photo: Damjan Tadic/HANZA MEDIA

Imagine this: it’s Friday 20 October 2017, a very important government office report is about to be read and tabled in parliament. Your eyes circle attentively around the chamber, apart from the State Secretary for Croats living abroad and his assistant, the government front bench is empty – all the ministers and Prime Minister probably too busy elsewhere to clear their diary for attendance here. There are barely 20 out of 151 members of parliament sitting on their seats, including two of three representatives for the diaspora – General Zeljko Glasnovic and Bozo Ljubic (Couldn’t spot Zeljko Raguz, the third MP for diaspora). The report to be read is that of the government’s Office for Croats living outside Croatia – the first one, in fact, even if the Office has been operational for almost five years (most of those under the former Social Democrats government that set up the office in the first place).

You ask yourself: is this truly the parliament majority of whose members, whether government or opposition, incessantly give public statements how the diaspora is the most important element that can ensure future prosperity for Croatia? Incessantly keep saying how Croats from the diaspora need to return, need to invest – are desired and welcome… You shake your head in disbelief; so much energy wasted in creating the hope that the Croatian diaspora will once again (after twenty years of leftist consistent politically fuelled erosion) become a vibrant and indispensable part of Croatia as it was during the 1990’s times of fight for independence and freedom – the relative apathy radiating from the empty seats in the parliament suffocates with disappointment.

When the nation is looking forward to change – and attracting significantly increased diaspora engagement in the domestic economy and demographics is one of them – these ambassadors of change are busy bunking! It’s a serious problem when teachers bunk classes in schools, but it’s perfectly fine if you are member of parliament! The shortage of attendance of MP’s does not only reflect their carefree attitude towards the problems and challenges that we as a nation face but it is an insult to the apex authority of the Parliament. People who have no respect for the parliament should not have been nominated in the very first place. But that’s another issue that reeks for changes in the electoral system.

State Secretary Zvonko Milas tabled his report about what has been done for Croats living abroad, for the diaspora. While acknowledging that more work could have been done by the office in the past years Milas emphasised that connection with the diaspora has been active with some 50 advisers from the diaspora, however the Office and its work have largely remained unknown to the diaspora Croats. He said that there have been a number of infrastructure built especially in the areas of education (Croatian language and culture) across the world and that Croatia has financed some 40 million kunas (5.3 million euro) worth of diaspora projects last year. The Office’s strategy has focused especially on areas of Croatian identity in the diaspora through assistance with language and culture but also fostering connections with Croatian organisations and business networks.

There are three strategic goals that the Office wants to achieve, Milas said: develop cooperation, protect rights and interests of Croats outside Croatia and strengthen their communities, encourage the return of emigrants and their descendants. Milas announced the establishment of a new TV channel for the diaspora attached to mainstream state TV HRT. Milas did not in his report give away any notable detailed or concrete steps or strategies how these goals will be achieved – apart from help with Croatian language and culture education. Which, can mean that concrete strategies or steps are still in the development stage.

One thing that disappoints from this report and announced goals is actually in the lack of concrete reference to the needed integration of Croatian diaspora with Croatia, homeland. Helping and supporting the diaspora with its own educational organisations, helping it maintain a Croatian identity is not integration but rather maintenance of status quo that could be seen as “you stay where you are and we will help you”. Integration requires engaging the diaspora in matters that are relevant within Croatia. That in essence means extending the rights and obligations enjoyed by the Croatian citizens in Croatia itself to Croatian citizens living abroad. And there has so far been little of that, apart from some half-baked initiatives that barely wet the ground let alone help it flourish.

General Zeljko Glasnovic
Independent Member of Parliament for Diaspora
Photo: Screenshot

While noting the good work the Office has done with limited means, especially in the area of cooperation, the independent Member of Parliament for the diaspora, General Zeljko Glasnovic, alerted in his speech and reply to the sorely lacking strategies and concrete steps to be taken for integration of diaspora to homeland. He particularly drew attention to the need to develop strategies, to improve Croatian citizenship access for the diaspora which is still abominably long and complicated, to improve and provide acceptable access to voting by introduction of postal and electronic voting …he noted that Croatia still has socialist bureaucracy that stifles and denies progress and a diplomatic core riddled with former communist Yugoslavia UDBA secret service operatives whose interests lie only in their personal ones. He said that people from diaspora would not return to Croatia until the “judicial quagmire” is fixed. The barriers they encounter upon wanting to return are still enormous, he emphasised.

Bozo Petrov
Member of Parliament,
President of Most/Bridge Independent Lists
Photo: Screenshot

Bozo Petrov, Most/Bridge coalition of independent lists, went on to also criticise the government’s lack of actions in solving the problems Croatians in Bosnia and Herzegovina face. When we talk about the status of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina the biggest challenge is reflected in the respecting of Constitutional court’s decision regarding the non-constitutionality of the election of members for the House of Peoples of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the change of electoral law. He said that the electoral law needs to be changed as soon as possible.

So, to summarise what’s going on in Croatian parliament regarding the Croatian diaspora at this stage one could say that the government’s side is leaning more to activities that help maintain identity of Croatian diaspora abroad while the independent member for the diaspora, General Zeljko Glasnovic, places emphasis on diaspora engagement and integration with the homeland. The latter, of course, in today’s globalised world is so much more relevant and important than anything else. I would go further here and say that, given the almost daily invitations that come from Croatian leaders for the return of emigrants and their increased contributions to Croatia’s economic development, it’s the integration strategies that will produce desired results more than any strategy in any other moves that support the diaspora. The diaspora is watching this space with great interest and Croatia needs to take on more and stronger initiatives for action. Ina Vukic

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Bozo Ljubic, Croatia, Croatian diaspora, Zeljko Glasnovic, Zeljko Raguz, Zvonko Milas

Battles For Victims Of Communist Crimes And Croatia’s Homeland War

October 11, 2017 by inavukic 10 Comments

Damir Markus (L) Charles Billich (C) Damir Plavsic (R)
Phoro: AB

When politicians in positions of relative or specific power in Croatia, especially those beating the drum of integration between Croatia and its diaspora, visit the diaspora, which is made up of all sides of historical political spectrums, one would expect them to park their politics at the door and engage with all sides. Given that those in power in Croatia have so far shown little, if any interest, in ridding Croatia of the stronghold former communists have over the nation’s life, which is plummeting into living standard chaos and desperation for many, one would expect that the side that promotes remembrance of victims and justice for the multitudes of communist crimes that occurred during the life of communist Yugoslavia as well as the victims of Croatia’s 1990’s Homeland War would finally receive due notice, without any reservations. But no, what Croatia still has in its corridors of power is multitudes of unrepentant supporters of the communist system that killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people and chased out in fear for their own life and survival, into the diaspora, equally as many. It still has too many in the corridors of power that avoid reckoning with the Serb and communist Yugoslavia Army aggressors who sought to destroy the Croats who wanted freedom from communist Yugoslavia.

If the spark of a push to decommunise Croatia fails to ignite big fires within the people to achieve decommnisation then the die-hard communist Yugoslavia supporters will go to their graves believing that all the murder had been worth it in order to achieve that deluded fantasy of a “worker’s paradise”, which in reality brought workers to their knees as inflation in the country, by late 1980’s, surged beyond 1100%. So powerful is ideology that a person can be brilliant in certain fields of professional pursuits and yet at the same time totally blind to one form of evil. And communism in Yugoslavia was evil. 1990’s Serb aggression against Croatia was evil.

How one views the extreme, pathological end of an ideology also influences how one looks at its norms. The young in Croatia are distressingly ignorant of the crimes of communist Yugoslavia, they are also ignorant of the fact that Serb aggression against Croatia in early 1990’s was based on intent to murder and intent to ethnically cleanse Croats from their lands (specifically one-third of Croatia that became known during the war [and after the Croats were ethnically cleansed and multitudes murdered] as Republic of Serbian Krajina). They are ignorant of these facts because the powers that be systematically cover-up the crimes or fail to pay due diligence to them and downplay the absolute need for self-defense and self-preservation Croats were forced into.

One way to remedy this situation and set Croatia on the right footing to full democracy based on a reconciled past is commemorate the victims of Communism in the same way it’s done for the victims of all totalitarian regimes. There should be no concept of competition in this as all totalitarian regimes carried almost equal loads of indulgence that resulted in human sufferings.

In dealing with the legacies of fifty-year communist dictatorship in Croatia (as part of former Yugoslavia), the transition to democracy, after the Homeland War ended and all Serb-occupied territory liberated or reintegrated (1998) official Croatia has never confronted itself with the issue of what to do with the perpetrators of oppression and human rights violations before 1990, and to what extent, and how, to compensate the victims; to punish the perpetrators of mass murders and purges. Multitudes of people were at one point or another imprisoned on political grounds, scores upon scores sentenced to death without a fair trial, scores upon scores assassinated and murdered both in Croatia and in the diaspora, the whole Croatian national identity vilified as extremist, properties confiscated or nationalised for the use and/or ownership of communist operatives … a screening procedure by which people who had been collaborators or informers of the secret police (UDBA) as well as high ranking party officials should be banned from prominent positions in the government, the army, and the courts has not been developed nor adopted. Lustration did not occur and it must, whether it be through a radical break or some negotiated compromise.

Croatia should not and must not forget any of those who paid for its present freedom from communist Yugoslavia in one way or another. Independent courts should impartially consider the possible guilt of those who were responsible for the persecutions, so that the truth about the communist past may be fully revealed. This is, however, only a dream of democracy amidst the court system that still harbours those who participated in the persecutions in one way or another.

Compensating the victims of communist crimes is the last thing Croatian political machinery in power wants to do. Compensating the victims of the 1990’s Homeland War is a far, far cry from any justice or human dignity; why, Croatia has not even claimed from Serbia calculated war damages amounting to some 44 billion euro! That says quite a lot about the will, or rather the lack of it, in Croatia’s power corridors to fully address the victims of Serb aggression and the losses Croatia sustained.

Commemorative events, laying wreaths at many mass gravesites and the Bleiburg field for victims of communist crimes and memorial cemeteries or gravesites for victims of the Homeland War have become a way of life in Croatia for many who keep the memory of hard-won freedom alive. While this in essence is a pursuit of human dignity and remembrance it is not enough for justice and for collective remembrance; it reduces national suffering to individual or group ones; it waters down the suffering Croats have endured under communism in Yugoslavia and under Serb-aggression as Croatia set about breaking away from communist Yugoslavia.

Ivan Penava (L) Ljiljanna Ravlich (C) Zvonko Milas (second from R)
Photo: Facebook

In recent months the Sydney, Australia, based world renowned artist of Croatian descent, along with his numerous family members a victim of communist crimes and oppression, Charles Billich, publicly announced his wish and plan to erect a memorial monument in Croatia honouring the victims of communist crimes and the victims of the 1990’s Homeland War. Without a doubt this gesture has national pride significance for the Croatian people and their suffering. Knowing the terrible history associated with those victims such a monument is surely a platform that lifts into a permanent conscience the debt a free and independent democratic Croatia owes to them. But, as it appeared via a recent visit to Australia by the Croatia’s state secretary for the government office for Croats living outside Croatia, Zvonko Milas and Vukovar’s mayor Ivan Penava, seen as representing a “leading” political mood hovering about Croatia, such honouring of victims of communist crimes and those of the Homeland War is avoided rather than encouraged. In the same party of visitors to Australia were also two men, heroic Homeland War veterans, Damir Plavsic and Damir Markus, writers, producers and activists of the theatrical play “The Battle for Vuovar” (Vukovar was devastated by Serb aggression during the 1990’s Homeland War and became the symbol of Croatia’s fight for independence from communist Yugoslavia).

The “political” representatives of this group visiting Australia, Zvonko Milas and Ivan Penava, made a point to meet with the former Western Australia Legislative Council member and former Australian Labor Party minister WA Ljiljanna Ravlich, a Croatian born former Australian politician whose father was a communist Partisan in the Yugoslav Army and whom she has proudly painted a portrait of with the (Red) star on his cap, but expressly avoided even acknowledging Charles Billich, let alone offering a hand-shake for his announced remarkable gift to Croatia in the form of a monument to victims of communist crimes and Homeland War. This expressed avoidance occurred at a Croatian club in Sydney where Billich attended to honour the visitors from Croatia even at the cost of having to leave his prior engagement as official artist of the World Polo Championships held this month in Sydney.

Ljiljana Ravlich with portrait
of her father – communist star on cap
Photo: Screenshot

Croatia’s veterans and defenders of Vukovar, Damir Plavsic and Damir Markus made the point of meeting with Charles Billich at the same Croatian club and visiting his gallery at the Rocks, in Sydney. They also invited Billich to give a speech at the Croatian Club, which he accepted, confirming yet again his determined and monetarily generous plan to erect the monument in Croatia to victims of communist crimes and Croatia’s Homeland War.

Through this episode at the Croatian club in Sydney it is clear that avoidance of dealing with due justice for victims of communist crimes and victims of the Homeland War strongly exists in Croatia but, fortunately, there are many, especially in the diaspora, who will persist at it until full justice is done. Ina Vukic