Ivan Penava – Croatia, the War, and the Future

Croatia: Majority (Croat) Rights Vs. Minority (Serb) Rights

July 20, 2019 by inavukic 12 Comments

Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic, President of Croatia (L)
Ivan Penava, Mayor of Vukovar (R)
Photo: uredpredsjednice.hr

When the Constitutional Court of Croatia (of any country) evidently and blatantly misses the beat of its own country’s heart (and reason for existence – in the case of Croatia that reason is victory over brutal Serb aggression in the Homeland War) then one could justly pose the question of whether the nation should permit such undermining of its defining morality and character that are the beacons for justice and, if you like, full democracy. When minority rights are taken out of the context of national suffering and the need to pursue justice for the victims of brutal aggression, one inevitably ends up with major problems and discontent; and blatant unfairness at the basic human level. And so, while on the one hand Croatia battles a political crisis with overtures of restructure of its government, Serb minority rights claims are in a hot seat that requires determination and resolve to end Serb provocation in Croatia once and for all.

For most lawyers, constitutional courts’ success in protecting democracy should be measured by their jurisprudential record – their performance according to legal professional standards of appropriate decision-making. On this view of things, courts are essentially reactive institutions. The only power they have to influence the quality of democracy is to interpret democratic rights in the cases they happen to be asked to decide. For many political scientists, this legalistic measure is inadequate. What needs to be assessed is the actual impact of a court’s decisions on the overall quality of democracy, i.e. life in the country that cannot ignore the priority of essential needs of its people, or majority. On this account, constitutional courts have much greater agency than lawyers give them credit for. They should be seen as political institutions with the capacity to adjust their decisions according to their likely effects. Especially in developing democracies such as Croatia, which still has a long way to go towards delivering justice for victims of Serb aggression of early 1990’s. But given that most judges still sitting in that court in Croatia are remnants of the Yugoslav communist minds the political pull or effects of Constitutional Court judgments have so far mostly gone towards Yugo-nostalgia rather than independent Croatia. If it were the latter Croatia would not, almost 30 years after the Homeland War still be gasping and pleading for justice and human fairness towards the enormous number of victims of Serb aggression.

Ivan Penava, the Mayor of Vukovar, has Friday 19 July 2019 accused sections of Croatian society of turning their heads away from the Homeland War and its victims.

“I hear in the statements these days: He does not respect the Constitution, we are modern, we are liberal and we insist that the Constitution be respected. Gentlemen, for 28 years you have not respected that same Constitution and now you have the cheek to come to a city that was destroyed and bombarded with 6.5 million grenades … You hold such attitudes and you come to Vukovar to ask the Mayor if he will respect the Constitution. Yes he will; this has never been an issue. The Mayor will be the first to respect it. However, I ask you where your humanness and cheek are, when you give yourself the right to come here and ask such a question,” Ivan Penava told reporters accusing parts of the Croatian society of having turned their heads away from the Homeland War, from the raped, the missing, the killed and raped and do not see problems with which the people of Vukovar are faced.

“We are not talking about Peter and Mark here. We are talking about thousands of those killed and imprisoned, of hundreds that were raped and again of thousands of displaced people, of those whose rights were denied them. For many of these it’s unfortunately too late for any kind of justice,” concluded Ivan Penava.

This Penava reaction comes post Croatian Constitutional Court decision of 2 July 2019, which determined that Vukovar City councillors from the Serb ethnic minority should have the same conditions as councillors of Croatian ethnicity. I.e., among other things that Council meeting minutes, agendas etc. should be made available in the Serbian Cyrillic script.

According to HINA News Agency report Mayor Ivan Penava said Friday that for the town authorities it was not at all disputable whether or not he would respect the decision of the Constitutional Court, which concluded that the rights of the Serb national minority in Vukovar had to be improved, and he also said that no law was self-contained purpose but must be in the service of the people.

In August 2015, Vukovar changed its town statute to say that the collective rights of the Serb minority [re street signs, government building signs etc.) in the area of the town of Vukovar are to be ensured when the conditions are met.

Under this change, councillors in Vukovar of Serb extraction could get documents issued in the Serbian Cyrillic language/script, but only if they made specific written requests for that.

The Vukovar council voted for the changes in November 2013, proclaiming Vukovar a “city of special significance” exempt from Croatian minority rights legislation because of what it suffered when it was besieged and destroyed by Serbian forces in 1991.

The move came after months of protests sparked by the official introduction of bilingualism, as envisaged by Croatian law in places where a minority makes up more than 30 per cent of the population, as Vukovar’s Serb community does. It must be remembered though that this percentage has been disputed on the fact that no credible census was had to establish it and that the percentage claimed could well have been falsely boosted by Serbs who are registered as living in Vukovar but in fact reside in Serbia.

However, Croatia’s Committee on Human and National Minority Rights complained about the statute changes and requested an evaluation of their constitutionality.

2 July 2019 Constitutional Court decision overturned some of the Vukovar Town Council statue changes, decreeing that Serbs – whether councillors or members of the public – must be able to get official documents in their own language and script.

Miroslav Separovic, President of the Constitutional Court said that Vukovar Town Council will have to extend the level of the rights of the Serbian ethnic minority and that the court will not tolerate any delays because nothing has been done so far.

While the President of the Republic of Croatia cannot comment on the decision of the Constitutional Court Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic did, however, on Friday 19 July, point to Article 8 of the Constitutional Law on the Rights of National Minorities, which states that these rights must be interpreted and applied with the aim of respecting the minorities and the Croat people, developing understanding, solidarity, tolerance and dialogue among them. Grabar Kitarovic holds that under such circumstances, when the fundamental human rights are neglected, the necessary prerequisites for the expansion of special rights that have to become a democratic standard in Croatia have not been procured and she agreed that it is bad to delay them. However, she called for the same criteria to be applied to proceedings against war crimes suspects and that the declaration by appropriate authorities regarding those cannot be delayed, either. Such an attitude is a good prerequisite for regulated relations based on the trust of the majority people and members of the Serbian national minority, especially in the wounded Vukovar.

The Republic of Croatia must pay particular attention to Vukovar, and it is also a duty of the top state authorities to demand the resolution to the injustice felt by the population of Vukovar. It is inconceivable that nobody has been made responsible for the massacre at Borovo Selo and that no one solved the question of 30,000 concentration camp detainees, the missing … How will we justify this from the constitutional as well as from the moral aspect?

“Because of this, the position of Ivan Penava, the Mayor of Vukovar, may not be called as disrespectful of the Constitutional Court’s decision, but an invitation, which I personally support, to finally close the issues of the past and thus provide a sincere opportunity for the future. I do not want any separation or conflict between Croats and Serbs, but I call for patience and consideration, which implies accepting the fact that Vukovar is still treating its wounds. I hold that the obligation of state institutions is to make more effort as soon as possible and find the best solutions that will not cause tension and distrust among people, but rather the opposite,” said President Grabar-Kitarović.

Indeed, even at the merely basic level of human fairness one cannot condone the pressure (from Constitutional Court) to implement promulgation of minority rights when that same court has done nothing to pressure the minority (Serb) to act of the rights of the majority (Croats). By saying this I am aware that while deliberating its decision on Serb minority rights in Vukovar the Constitutional Court was well appraised of the majority rights that stand behind the initial limitation, suspension or ban of the Cyrillic script in Vukovar! Ina Vukic

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Croatia, Croatian Constitutional Court, Ivan Penava, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic, Majority rights Croatia, Minority rights Croatia, Serb aggression in Croatia, Vukovar

Mini-Yugoslavia in Croatia (?)

September 9, 2018 by inavukic 9 Comments

Zeljko Glasnovic, MP for Croatian Diaspora

Many Australian Croats as part of the Croatian diaspora are looking forward to the Croatia Uncensored tour that commences next week, headed by the Member of the Croatian Parliament for the Diaspora, retired general Zeljko Glasnovic. Much to talk about, much to ask, much to pursue especially given that Glasnovic has been one of the leading voices and staunchest promoters in the Croatian Parliament and in public for a decommunised and lustrated Croatia.

Croatian people are certainly not the only nation in the world where, when it comes to the state of the nation, people at large are attracted to the problem rather than the solution. Whether a solution to a problem comes, or not, can only depend on actions devised, employed and implemented from the pool of complainants, the unhappy, the angry, the disillusioned, the devastated, the desperate… And so we come to the burning issue of pervasive, in terms of democracy repulsive communist mindset in Croatia despite the brilliantly successful defence of Croatian independence during the war of Serb/Yugoslav aggression in early 1990’s.

Post year-2000 in Croatia there has been no government in power in Croatia that has had a “smooth run”. On the contrary, every such government is marked by loud protests from the masses as well as from individual politicians (usually the independents and opposition) that not enough is done to successfully transition Croatia into a fully functional democratic state by way of reforms and lustration. Lustration, or ridding Croatia of institutionalised communist habits and mindset was/is The “weapon” essential to democratic progress. But, no doubt about it, nepotism, corruption tied to political favouritism, dependency on government/state bred into the nation by the communist regime, among other tactics employed by a totalitarian regime had a life of their own, resisting viciously and indiscriminately needed change and progress.

Despite the economic and standard of living persistent crises, what Croatia had since year 2000 was every government telling or boasting to the nation of reforms and progress it has pursued and achieved but the most important reform – lustration – was not and is not a part of that progress. And yet real progress depends on lustration – absolutely! Lustration for Croatia is akin to the foundations of a solid house; in the sense of building a democratically functional state of Croatia all facets of operational communist Yugoslavia must be excavated from the foundations and Croatian values pursued during the Homeland War, War of Independence, must be cemented into the foundations. Disillusionment and bitterness about the fact that this still has not been done continues and is seen on almost every corner.

And, yet, the fact that the people (i.e. masses / general population) are the ultimate authority in this and every country has it seems eluded the disillusioned. That is to say, much to the government’s delight – I dare say – one cannot see a unification of all that are pursuing lustration, i.e. raising to the top as the national priority of values fought for, paid for in blood and devastation during the Homeland War. And so the past governments thrived on this, as does the current one.

The current Croatian government, as those before it, continues to push the Brussels (EU) so-called Western Balkans project as the key statehood question! Bypassing and downgrading, as all others since year-2000 have, the actual key Croatian statehood question that’s embedded in the values of the Homeland War. To make matters alarmingly worse, Prime Minister Andre Plenkovic has at a public forum in Dubrovnik last week in his speech referred to “some conflicts that have occurred in this region” (not calling those conflicts by their real name “Serb aggression)! The Croatian public was rightfully outraged, for even if after the speech Plenkovic insisted that he was just referring to conflicts in Kosovo, the sensitive and disillusioned public took those words as also referring to the war of Serb/Yugoslav aggression against Croatia in the early 1990’s. After all, why wouldn’t they? The values of Croatia’s Homeland War, apart from hollow rhetoric at certain commemorations, are neither upheld nor promoted through essential reforms, which must include lustration.

There are many examples throughout the past couple of decades or so of government and presidential public rhetoric holding or suggesting that what occurred in Croatia in early 1990’s was a “civil war”! Such statements are malicious and designed to keep communist Yugoslavia breathing, in the hope for a new lease on life; they are fodder for the so-called Western Balkans project. This project factors highly in the heads of some EU leaders, movers and shakers; promoted by Germany’s Angela Merkel especially. The resolve to support Croatia’s independence during the early 1990’s demonstrated by Germany’s key supporters for an independent Croatia Helmut Kohl (former German Chancellor) and Hans-Dietrich Genscher (former German Foreign Minister) has with the coming of Merkel been drowned into insignificance. Plenkovic’s reported ambitions to succeed at leading the EU Commission after Jean-Claude Juncker goes can safely be associated with his line of pursuits that includes supporting the Western Balkans project. To add weight to this, however repulsive and unwanted that weight is to a great majority of Croatian people, Plenkovic’s government, in its seemingly tight coalition with the Independent Serb Democratic Party in Croatia and its president Milorad Pupovac, has opened wide gates for Serbs to wield power and cause distress in Croatia, pushing the line of belittling Croatia’s Homeland War and attempting to negate the bloody and brutal Serb aggression against Croatia in early 1990’s; keeping alive the Greater Serbia project within Croatia; supporting Serbia’s deplorable denial of aggression against Croatia and the utterly repugnant Serbia’s propaganda relating to World War II in Croatia. At this point suffice to say, that Pupovac has, as recently as last month, threatened one of Croatia’s leading researchers into WWII facts on Jasenovac camp, Igor Vukic, for unveiling research results/facts that blow the communist and Serb propaganda against WWII Croatia out of the water!

When in August 2018, on the Day of Croatian Homeland War Victory celebrations, Pupovac accompanied Serbia’s president Aleksandar Vucic in Backa Palanka, Serbia, to give weight and meaning to Vucic’s statement in which he maliciously compared modern Croatian state to a Nazi state, there were no sanctions in Croatia against Pupovac (Member of Croatian Parliament) nor against Serbia. Not even sending Serbia’s Ambassador in Croatia packing, like most countries would do!

No lustration, active degradation of values of Croatia’s Homeland War, negligence and dismissiveness of the importance Croatian veterans and victims of Serb aggression should play in society, active support of Serb anti-Croatian independence politics in Croatia, to name but a few spurs lining the path of keeping the notion of a Yugoslavia alive in Croatia; it is like Yugoslavia still exists there, albeit in a mini version.

A good example demonstrating this for a fully functional democracy (thoroughly rid of communist Yugoslavia) atrocious state in Croatia is perhaps entwined in the recent words by Vukovar’s Mayor Ivan Penava, who is calling the people to a public rally for human rights in October 2018:

“ All crimes have a first name and a surname, after all that has passed, not all Vukovar citizens can remain hostages of past, present and future deals and negotiations. I seek that we take a clear and decisive stand towards the events of the past, the Yugoslav People’s Army, the Greater Serbia and that we embed without compromise such a relationship in everything we do, on every occasion. It’s impermissible that as a State and a system we have no strength for pointing out the perpetrators, for demanding the acknowledgment of the evil perpetrated by the criminal regime, seek apology and compensation for the victims. Besides all that, we are pursuing alliances with those who among themselves hide the guilty, who know everything about certain crimes but choose to stay silent…In light of that, the City of Vukovar is organising and invites people to a peaceful, non-political rally for basic human rights, and against the shameful silence of institutions of Croatian society…” Ina Vukic

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Andre Plenkovic, Croatia, Ivan Penava, lustration, Milorad Pupovac, Serbia, Yugoslavia, Zeljko Glasnovic

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