Zeljko Glasnovic,
Member of Croatian Parliament for the Diaspora
26 January 2018
Photo: Screenshot
The concept and practice of political correctness that has evolved during the past couple of decades has also given rise to the phenomenon of oppressive righteousness that is in many ways misguided and incomplete, hence, giving rise to a need to push back against it when it spills over into absurdity, and injustice.
Thursday 25 January 2018, ahead of the international marking of the International Holocaust Remembrance Day (27 January) Serbia opened at the UN building in New York an exhibition, called “Jasenovac – The Right Not to Forget”. On the face of it and given the occasion one can support the ethos and the core of human identity that trickles through such exhibitions: remembrance of victims of all crimes.
However, that ethos for Serbia’s exhibition at the UN becomes an insignificant secondary matter, even visibly and disturbingly unintended by the exhibition’s organisers (Serbia) when one focuses on the fact that in this exhibition Serbia – once again – omitted to remember its own WWII Holocaust victims. It has, one could say, forgotten the 94% of Serbia’s WWII Jews its WWII Milan Nedic government exterminated by May 1942, thus becoming boastfully one of the first “Jew-Free” (Judenfrei) nations in Europe. What this exhibition at the UN demonstrates clearly is that Serbia doesn’t really care for the victims of the Holocaust, for perpetuation of remembrance of the Holocaust victims, but it does care about covering up its own Holocaust history and pointing the guilty finger at Croatia and camp Jasenovac. Serbia of today demonstrates the continued oppression against Croatia in similar ways it operated during the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and during the post-WWII communist Yugoslavia.
Using half-truths and lies has evidently become the material of Serbian leadership’s genetic makeup.
Perpetuating the false (brazenly increased) numbers of Holocaust victims that perished in Jasenovac – when reality of victim numbers was most likely up to ten times less than what Serbs claim, purposefully distorting history, when facts point to Jasenovac being an extermination camp for communist Yugoslavia purges (headquartered in Serbia) years after WWII ended, perpetuating its lies that Croatia’s Blessed Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac was a Nazi/Ustashi collaborator when independently researched facts (e.g. Dr. Esther Gitman) show that he saved both Jews and Orthodox Serbs during WWII, can lead only to one conclusion: Serbia’s propaganda agenda continues to fixate on vilification of the Croatian nation of today and of the past.
It is, therefore, an indisputable, albeit an act of human depravity, that Serbia, with the help of political lobby coming from the likes of Israeli Holocaust selective historian Gideon Greif and Simon Wiesenthal Centre’s shallow but politically bent Efraim Zuroff , has with this UN exhibition given itself “Judenfrei Serbia – The Right To Forget”.
It’s a shame that official Croatia hasn’t responded determinedly to this UN exhibition regarding the Holocaust and mounted its own exhibition in the same UN building, at the same time – exhibiting the truth and including all Holocaust victims within the territory of former Yugoslavia. But then, to come up with such constructive, just and enlightening response to Serbia’s exhibition requires a good will and determination and unity for exhibiting WWII truth, which appear to be calamitously lacking in Croatia. The corridors of Croatia’s government power-wielding echelons have been and are destructively riddled with communist Yugoslavia sympathisers in whose personal interests it is to permit Serbia to do as it pleases when it comes to guilt for sins committed against humanity during WWII – as long as the communists of the time are thus shielded from having to answer for their own sins against humanity!
Certainly, Croatia has plenty of capable and professional academics, historians, researchers, politicians, clergy, journalists and activists who have (especially after the 1991 secession from communist Yugoslavia) been pointing to and unveiling the facts about Jasenovac, about Blessed Alojzije Stepinac, about the WWII Independent State of Croatia – all of which facts blow the Serbian and communist Yugoslavia propaganda out of the water! But, these people act in relative isolation from each other so that such demonstrations of truth appear as personal endeavours rather than a nationally coordinated one. Official Croatia has done absolutely nothing to rein in the wealth of information and facts, which point to its true WWII history (not the one generated by Serbia and communist Yugoslavia).
Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic said at the Belgrade-sponsored Jasenovac exhibition’s opening on Thursday evening that its goal was to prevent the deaths at the concentration camp in Croatia from being downplayed. “The goal of this exhibit is not just to introduce the international public to a lesser-known chapter of WWII. It is also to warn about the dangers from a revival of the ideology and political practice which led to such atrocities,” he said.
Apparently official Croatia tried to stop Serbia’s UN exhibition on bases that it promotes untruths and falsities but it withdrew from that upon discovery that the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres (a Socialist from his past political activities) had approved for the exhibition to go ahead even if he qualified that permission by saying that the UN has distanced itself from the exhibition and its content!
But the Croatian foreign ministry said that the use of Jasenovac for “everyday political and propaganda” purposes was “unacceptable”. The exhibit was prepared without the participation of Croatia’s Jasenovac Memorial Centre, said Croatia’s Foreign Minister Marija Pejcinovic Buric.
Maria Pejcinovic Buric
Croatia’s Foreign Minister
Photo: HINA
“We express deep respect for all the victims of the Ustasha regime and in the strongest possible terms we condemn all its crimes and particularly crimes committed in the Jasenovac camp,” a foreign ministry of Croatia statement said. “Because of the respect for the victims, we consider it utterly unacceptable to use the suffering in Jasenovac for propaganda purposes or the goals of daily politics,” it said.
Croatian foreign ministry response to the exhibition is fine but the Croatian government failed to capture and express the essence and the meaning for the Croatian nation this exhibition targets. Certainly, majority of people see that it is an attack on Croatia and its people because, besides posting falsehoods about Jasenovac, it actually implies that there is a threat of revival of the ideology in Croatia that led to atrocities of the Holocaust during WWII.
While Croatian politicians such as HDZ’s (political party with governing majority in the parliament) Miro Kovac reacted for Croatian media to Serbia’s exhibition with: “What official Serbia is doing now is, unfortunately, what was seen in the communist Yugoslavia, and that is a continuation of imposing a campaign of collective guilt and genocide against Croatians. Franjo Tudjman was strongly opposed to this…”, the official reactions have been inappropriately scarce.
Miro Kovac
Member of Croatian Parliament
Photo: fah
Given the heartbreaking effect this mean-spirited and inaccurate as to facts exhibition at the UN has had on Croatian masses in Croatia and abroad, one expected the Croatian Parliament to set aside a time in its agenda with view to drawing up a strategy that would protect its people’s future from such Serbian scum (sorry, I find it difficult not to refer to lies as scum). But no – no such ingenuity or fairness from that lot that’s leading that parliament at this time!
One saving grace for such a parliament, though, was the speech delivered in Croatian Parliament on Friday 26 January 2018 by the independent Member of Parliament General Zeljko Glasnovic, representative for the Croatian diaspora. Here is what he said regarding the matter:
“…Basic human rights are jeopardised in Croatia. Which rights? The right to equality before the courts of law, the right to private ownership … not even 5% of land titles have been sorted, and yet we impersonate a plural democracy…
…is the right to truth a basic human right? When we’re talking about the truth here you have an exhibition about Jasenovac on East River, New York … 700,000 victims – falsified history again …when are we going to comprehend that a large professional Greater Serbia brokerage still reigns in Croatia, here in this country, that purposefully hides the true lists of those victims not only from Jasenovac but from the Second World War… when are we going to be conscious of that …
…From abroad, we are looked upon exclusively on the basis of the history of the Second World War, we still do not have an official history of that period… seated here are some people…doctors of history, science etc…what’s happening here? Do we wonder about that… in Josipovic’s days there was 50% of people in the government cabinet who were collaborators of former UDBA (communist Yugoslavia secret services), members of the Communist Party, and Yugophiles, like Dejan Jovic, why are we astonished!
… they are paid…they are paid professional antifascists to hold Croatia on the prosecutor’s bench … they’ve crept into the media, into NGOs etc…what can we expect! … what’s with the archives we are trying to retrieve from Belgrade? I spoke about that in terms of succession (from Yugoslavia) that they must be returned … what has happened …Nothing… global public is still being deceived with them …
…Slovenia has written a book “Slovenia in 1945” mentioning 17,000 victims killed by the communists after WWII…naming almost all, released to the worldwide market…where are our victims …nowhere … total autism of our professional archivists and professional antifascists…and then we are astonished…the Armenians placed a DVD into Time Magazine some years back addressing their tragedy when they suffered under Turks…a total success …Ukraine…Holodomor …every city in Canada has a memorial to victims of communism …
…and Serbs are in front of us, they’ve formed a commission for war victims after 1944 … what are we doing about that issue, we have 18,000 names recorded…Roman Leljak went recently to Serbia and found lists of thousands upon thousands Croats killed in Serbia in 1944 … I’m giving this list I’ve written for the media to the government to see what’s happening here …
…what’s the inert Croatian diplomacy doing …nothing … the Memorial area Jasenovac … that exhibition now being held in New York …an agreement was assembled on 28th March 2017 between Serbia’s Ministry of Education and the Holocaust Institute in Israel, what is the response by the Jasenovac Memorial Centre which to this day falsifies Croatian history and its well paid for that …
…when are we going to condemn the Greater Serbia imperialism … the core of all evils in these areas … and here are seated some people who don’t know who attacked them … and I repeat that like a parrot until I’m six meters under … that the biggest problem here is Greater Serbia imperialism, which from 1912 to 1990 murdered hundreds of thousands in these areas …ether wearing the cockade or the five pointed star …
… and there is silence, he has been rehabilitated as Titoism, that murdered hundreds of thousands of people, has been … and while we stand here today to remember the victims of the Holocaust when are we going to remember the victims of communism … hundred million victims …
…what’s the worst here is that we have destroyed minds and brains among us … that is the biggest barrier for Croatia … communist mental heritage …
…and finally, what kind of a future does a country that pays for the falsification of its own history have … how can it conduct any international politics…horror!”
Video extract from Croatian Parliament Friday, 26 January 2018:
“If there is no struggle, there is no progress,” said on August 3, 1857, Frederick Douglass when he delivered a “West India Emancipation” speech at Canandaigua, New York, on the twenty-third anniversary of the event. Truer words said have been rare indeed when it comes to fighting oppression that perpetuation of lies and falsification of history bring. Croatia has many struggles on its hands in achieving the truth of its existence: a free and democratic state. The struggles though need to accumulate into a single, focused and organised force whose aim is to perpetuate the truth and shed the communist mindset and which has its heart in the Parliament – will this happen? We wait in expectation and anticipation. Ina Vukic
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Holocaust in Serbia 1941 – 1945 See the documentary shown as part of Bujica TV program in Croatia. The pat with the film (shown in two parts in this program) is subtitled in English.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZS1moJwGWc&w=560&h=315%5D
Thank you Ina for fighting Serbia’s bigotry and revision of historical facts. To my sorrow some of my fellow Jews of the kind of Ephraim Zuroff and Gideon Greif are assisting them which is beyond my understanding why? It is well documented that the prime movers of anti-Semitism in Yugoslavia, between the two World Wars, were not the Ustaše but media publishers of books such as Protocols of the Elders of Zion translated and published from 1929 to 1945 in Serbia. Although the Yugoslav Public Prosecutor in March 1935 banned its distribution, Lazar Prokić, “Our problems: Jews in Serbia,” Obnova, November 15, 1941 Zbor (assembly) published a brochure titled: Serb People in Claws of Jews.” Obnova, (Renewal) founder, Dimitrije Ljotić, modeled his work on Mein Campf. In Obnova and Naša Borba (Our Struggle)… Milorad Mojić advocated: “An energetic liquidation of Jewry unless we want to witness destruction of the Christian civilization.” From 1941-45, fifty one (51) anti-Semitic brochures were published in Serbia. Patriarch (Petar Rosić) Varnava in 1937 showed “interest in Hitler and his policy which, he argued, serves the whole of mankind.” In May, 1937, the Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC) in its official publication indicated that “Jews are a force hiding behind the Free Masonry, Capitalism and Communism, the three biggest evils of the world. The Serbian claim was that Jews in fact represented the Free Masonry, capitalism, and the proletariat revolution in the South Slavs and in the world. Rosić stated: They are just Jews and nothing else…Therefore enemy is as sly as a snake and appears in several shapes. That is why it is dangerous.
Serbian newspapers such as Obnova (Renewal) and Naša Borba (Our Struggle) praised this exhibit, proclaiming that Jews were the ancient enemies of the Serbian people and that Serbs should not wait for the Germans to begin the extermination of the Jews. The territory under German control was known as “Nedićeva Srbija” (Nedić’s Serbia). He managed to establish the Serbian State Guard, numbering about 18,000, compared to the 3,400 German police in Serbia. Recruiting advertisements for the Serb police force specified that “applicants must have no Jewish or Gypsy blood”. Dimitrije Ljotić, the principal Fascist ideologist of Serbia organized the Serbian Volunteers Corps, whose primary function was rounding up Jews, Gypsies, and partisans for execution. Serbian citizens and police received cash bounties for the capture and delivery of Jews. On August 13, 1941, under the leadership of Velibor Jonić, 545 Serbs including some of the country’s most prominent and influential figures, issued an “Appeal to the Serbian Nation” which called for loyalty to the ‘Nazis and condemned the Partisan resistance as unpatriotic.
It is the whole truth, the good and the bad, that will set us all free, Esther. The problem lies in Serbia’s hard-core attempts to bury its bad truth, thus disrespecting victims who deserve the truth. Situation being as such the greater the army of fighters against Serbia’s lies the better.
From April 1941 to May 1942 the destruction of Serbia’s Jewry involved two distinct phases. The first, which lasted between July and November 1941 involved the murder of Jewish men, who were shot as part of The retaliatory executions carried out by the forces of the Wehrmacht but Serbia’s Nedic government officers and their collaborators who knew them served the men to the German’s for slaughter in response to acts of insurgency and sabotage. The second phase between December 1941 and May 1942 involved the incarceration of the women and children at the Semlin camp in Belgrade and their gassing in a mobile gas van.
And Serbia has the gall to point a finger at Croatia!
And UN gives its premises to such abomination of human dignity! Horror, indeed!
Abomination indeed, Martin Bill.
” History is always written by the winners .”
Belgrade London Masonic connections . The UN has been a defacto global communist organisation since its conception .
Don’t expect justice there .
“Justice is just ice , governed by greed and lust .
With the strong doing what they can and the weak suffering what they must .”
For how long, I dare ask – Anto
Croatia’s government is and has been hopeless at protecting the truth but great at protecting communist lies – this exhibition is yet another proof. The government has done nothing to point out Serbia’s holocaust. You cannot be “nice” and “composed” at blatant lies Serbia is dishing out with numbers supposedly exterminated at Jasenovac. But Croatian government is eing “nice” and “composed” towards Croatia’s enemy in this case – with that it stands against its own people! Why! ? It’s not as if it’s ignorant about the facts of Serbia’s Holocaust!
The answer to your question is obvious, Marshalong. Sadly, it’s reasons as those that point to government incompetency that’s chasing good people out of Croatia.
Another big Sigh as I read this Ina.. It appears no one wants to admit to the truth of such horrors by admitting to it.. And this scar and wound will never heal unless the truth is faced..
It seems the Bible words “…and the truth will set you free…” have little meaning, Sue, regardless of their good intents … dodging the truth in some matters has become an art of politics, sadly. There are victims and there are victims it seems – sad.
Yes Ina, its all very sad.. 😪
Whenever somebody says: “You comitted a sin of murder and hate!”, just cry: “You have also some sins on your soul!” Whenever somebody says: “Nazis were killing innocent people in concentration camps!”, you say: “That is a communist lie!” So pathetic. And some of you still dare to declare theirselves as Christians. So pathetic indeed. Christianity is a religion of repentance, tolerance and non-voilence.
Yes Good Isaac, except I I believe you will not find much of what you are saying though. I have not come across any denials of Nazi crimes but I have come across denials of communist crimes. And so in your reasoning those denying communist crimes may be in the right. Wrong. All crime are just that and all victims absolutely equal and should be treated as such
Incredible that 25 years since independence no progress has been made by Croatia in establishing the truth and an official history. This shouldn’t be that hard.
No it shouldn’t be hard at all, Sunman – if there was a will. It seems the will is lacking among the ruling lot there. Tragic!
let us also not forget that Serbia has a history of anti-Jewish laws which they had on their books years before even WWI was fought let alone WWII. The Serbs are masters of lying as Dobrica Cosic once wrote: ” We lie to deceive ourselves, to exert one another; We lie from compassion, lie in shame, to encourage ourselves, to hide our bed, lie about honesty. We lie for freedom. The lie is a vision of Serbian patriotism and the confirmation of our born intelligence. We lie creatively, imaginatively, inventively.”
The problem with us Croatians is that we are afraid to defend ourselves, part of it has to do with the people who run the country as many are ex-communists who are quick to call out any Croatian who disagrees with them as “fascists,” and these ex-communists are Yugoslavs are heart who hate the fact that Croatia even exists. The next issue is simple, if they actually opened up the books their dirty little secret would come out and that is not only are the number of dead in Jasenovac fabricated but also that Jaseonovac was at the end a Partizan run death camp with many of the people listed at killed by the Croatians either were not only fabricated but never actually happened. You have people that were listed as killed there that never were killed or simply attributed to the Croatians when in reality they never were and that’s where the problem lies. The issue would simply be their hero Tito wouldn’t be the saint they try and make him out to be.
From the first Yugoslavia to the second Yugoslavia, Croatians were always viewed as the biggest threat to the that country remaining a country. they knew we Croatians have always been independence minded and thus we had to be made examples of in both Yugoslav states that existed. Notice in Tito’s Yugoslavia you never read about Serbia’s collaboration with the Nazi’s and the Juden Frei declaration, the Croatians were demonized by that government. There was a statistic were 65% of the political prisoners in Tito’s Yugoslavia were Croatian…some 20% were Albanian and the rest were from the other republics, what does that tell you?
There was also research done that during the years of WWII just over 1 million people died during those 4 years of all causes be it natural causes, sickness, heart attack, or killed and consider the number the “historians” throw out that 750,000 Jews, Gypsies, and Serbs were killed by Croatian that would make Croatians responsible for 70% of the total deaths in “Yugoslavia?” I think most people would say that is statistically impossible to do. Let us also not forget that Croatia at the time was fighting the Cetniks and the Partizans on its territory plus having to deal with the Italians and Germans as well…so as they say, something is fishy in Denmark.
Finally, name me one country in Europe that didn’t have its Nazi sympathizers and collaborators, just about every country had them and no one was exempt from this sin.
Stevie, I do trust the fundamental determination for self-determination among Croats will continue with resilience, wade through the lies and attacks to come out with pure truth , which of course is hidden by fabrications of numbers killed by Ustashi in WWII and non-disclosure of the sheer enormity and non-condemnation of communist crimes. We must not forget that Serbs were quite active within the communist regime that murdered Croats in Croatia in Serbia and abroad.
I demand to know why – despite your ‘Croatianess’ – you are able to write in my language far better than I can. It’s really not fair you know 🙂
Hehehe, Whelk, a reflection of Croatianess 🙂 open to new knowledge and progress. Part of the fight to exist in a global community
I am picking up a Croatian/English dictionary as we speak 🙂
Woohoo! 🙂
” It is also to warn about the dangers from a revival of the ideology and political practice which led to such atrocities,” he said ” Are you kidding me the Serbs killed 100000 Bosniak Civilians as recent as the 1990s c
A depraved way to avoid responsibility for crimes is to blame others and that’s what Serbia is doing, Aleksandra. Despicable!
Reblogged this on Ace News Desk.
Great post Ina …. We live as you say in a world of ‘ Political Correctness ‘ but many politicians and leaders believe they are so right about their policies …. And no longer is it … ‘ Elected to Serve ‘ but now it’s’ Elected for Gain’ …..So my believe is it’s become ‘ Political Righteousness for themselves not their Electorate ‘ …. Ian 😊👍⭐️
So true, Ian and one wonders will it go on for much longer…
I believe we are heading for change as for years it was underlying until bloggers like you and social media brought it too the forefront … Now we have fake news, lies and political machinations but people have the real power vote with your feet by not voting and in so doing change will come …. It’s painful child birth and the new change of conscious is no different … But when the baby is born all pain is forgotten … My believe it will culminate in 2020 to a peak and then we can start 7-years of rebuilding in preparation for the next kingdom on earth … Ian 🙏
That is a good train of thought, Ian – let’s work towards that goal of kingdom on Earth.
Absolutely Ina for me its not just a thought its part of my destiny has been for 30+ years NEWS North East West South the four corners of the world that God will roll up on earth we are on our way 🙏
Am waiting for Him, Ian <3
I know soon very very soon now 🙏
Serbia unlike croatia in ww2 was occupied and under direct cotnrol of german troops with puppet goverment which was unpopular and in as early as in 1941 had lost most of land to uprising called uzice republic.just like in croatia serbs were most numerous mbers of antifascist movement with negligible minority cooperating.
Banjica where jews were killed was managed by germans unlike jasenovac and other croatian camps of death.
Exbibiyon was of course political with just presentinng truth-thing which most scare Croats who have uncomparable more sins on their concisouness compared to Serbs.
Your dream about Serbia’s relative innocence is wearing thin, him
Recently I saw a program on Bujica with Roman Leljak, showing photos and documents of killing Jews in Belgrade . There were several documents listing Serbs importing hundreds of Jews from Jasenovac to Sajmiste for eventual gassing.
Also, there was a gruesome photo showing Jews hanging off the light poles on Terazije, while cetniks enjoying their drinks under the poles. Are you in possession of these photos? Perhaps Efraim Zurroff. would like to put it in his museum.
There is much new evidence about the extermination of Jews in WWII Serbia coming to light in recent years and I do hope it will help the truth come to light for once and for all, Zark.
Thanks Ina! From Bosnian with great respect! Ignorance and the attitude mix with the aggression, it always produce disgusting things, lies…. And trust me you do not know half of it. Survivor speaking, investigator and a living witness. I do not have strength anymore to cope with current day propaganda and how it poisons kids that are not built to resist. (that’s a different topic altogether).
I am feeling sorry for all orthodox-Serbs that must be…. to live under such myths and impositions. Such a situation is unbearable, they are partly to blame for not being educated more. Every victim counts but we must differentiate singe acts of violence (one must condemn and punish and pay homage to the victims anyway) and gruesome politics, leadership, state and majority that gave birth to blood bath and hell on earth ; and now changing narrative as portraying them self as victims and holies of holies. Some scary stuff when you are awake to realize monstrosity of what is happening now, humanity is at test.
Often I believe that if people who promote and fabricate lies all their lives start to admit to their lies they must prepare themselves to be humble for a while and change. Love is, I do not think the Serbs have reached tat point nor do they want it whie there are thise that look the other way ir even support such political tripe.