mujahedin – Croatia, the War, and the Future

Outrageous UN-Court Rape Of Croatian Historical Truth And Global Common Sense

General Slobodan Praljak

There are good reasons why death sentences have in most countries been abolished – one is that innocence of crimes can escape even those judges that enjoy the reputation of impeccable competence in judging evidence before the courts.

Do not for one moment even consider let alone believe that Croatian General Slobodan Praljak was a war criminal – his ICTY indictment did not include any crimes that he himself had committed against Muslims/Bosniaks, by his own hand. The crimes he and others in the group were indicted for basically come in the form of participating in a politically concocted concept and doctrine of joint criminal enterprise/line of command responsibility even if some actual crimes that have been said to have been committed occurred hundreds of kilometres away, hundreds of kilometres away from any knowledge or participation, any planning on their part…

The Croatian general Slobodan Praljak’s act of suicide by poison in the courtroom, Hague, on Wednesday 29 November 2017, after standing up in the dock and saying “Slobodan Praljak is not a war criminal and I reject your judgment with contempt”, is perhaps the strongest statement of disdain for unjust court verdict, injustice, the modern world has seen. Having served much of the 20 year prison sentence passed, awaiting ICTY trial and appeal, Praljak would have been out of prison within a couple of years. To his credit, that just and decent human being, Croat, was not going to serve a prison sentence as a wrongfully convicted war criminal a single day longer! That speaks volume of his courage and honour!

Rest in God’s peace and embrace, General Slobodan Praljak.

In its final judgment, before it closes operations, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague had shown its true, immersed in politics rather than facts colours. ICTY has on Wednesday demonstrated that it is a body that toys with history and evidently writes history – false history! If anything defines a joint criminal enterprise then this judgment itself would surely rate among the top culprits.

I am certain you have read numerous news articles or seen numerous videos, heard numerous audios paraphrasing and interpreting, in the simplest of forms, that which occurred in the Hague on 29 November 2017, in words to this effect: “While Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina were busy carving out the borders with ethnic cleansing and genocide of what became Serbian Republic within Bosnia and Herzegovina state borders, stamped as valid entity in the Dayton Agreement 1995, in the southwest, Herceg-Bosna region, Croat forces with significant support from Croatia turned on the Bosnian Army (Bosniaks/Muslims) and set out to establish their own ethnically homogenous space, using some of the same methods of ethnic cleansing employed by the Serbs…”. Yes, the bottom line of the ICTY Appeal Chamber finding was exactly that. The fact that the Croat-Muslim conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina broke out to a full war rests with Muslim/Bosniak (helped by Mujahedin’s from Middle East and surrounds) attacks and massacres, not the other way around. Just consider the massacres of Croats by Bosniak/Muslim forces in the villages of Luzani, Gusti Grab, Dusina in January 1993 and track the Muslim onslaught that continued with regular and vicious force against which the Croats needed to defend themselves, and your conclusion would be that Croats were not the aggressor as ICTY says.

The facts that are well known to the ICTY will lead you to Muslim-led Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ABiH) with its attachments of foreign fighters referred to as “Mujahedin” or “Holy Warriors”. The “Mujahedin”, who principally came from Islamic countries, began to arrive in Bosnia and Herzegovina sometime during the middle of 1992. The “Mujahedin” were prepared to conduct a “Jihad” or “Holy War” against those of different faith and religion in Bosnia and Herzegovina. ABiH with its Mujahedin forces attacked towns and villages mainly inhabited by Croats. Predominately Bosnian Croat civilians, including women, children, the elderly, and the infirm, were subjected to wilful killings and serious injury. In the course of, or after the attacks, many Croat civilians were killed and many more were wounded or harmed while attempting to hide or escape. In several instances, ABiH forces killed Croatian Defence Council (HVO) troops after their surrender. Mainly Bosnian Croats were unlawfully imprisoned and otherwise detained in ABiH detention facilities. The imprisoned and otherwise detained Bosnian Croats were killed and beaten, subjected to physical and / or psychological abuse, intimidation and inhuman treatment, including being confined in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions, and suffered inhumane deprivations of basic necessities, such as adequate food, water and clothing. They were provided little or no medical attention. Bosnian Croats who were imprisoned and otherwise detained were forced to dig trenches, to build bunkers and to collect human bodies in hostile and otherwise hazardous conditions. Some such imprisoned and otherwise detained persons were killed in the course of being forced to engage in such activities. Imprisoned and otherwise detained Croats were used as both human shields and hostages. ABiH forces plundered and destroyed Bosnian Croat property with no military justification. Bosnian Croat dwellings and buildings, as well as civilian personal property and livestock, were destroyed or severely damaged. In addition, Bosnian Croat buildings, sites and institutions dedicated to religion were targeted for destruction or otherwise damaged or violated…

Listing the atrocities committed by Bosniaks/Muslims against which Croats needed to defend themselves in Bosnia and Herzegovina would be an almost endless exercise if one were to examine ICTY recorded facts, but on 29 November 2017 the ICTY chose to pontificate without proof of individual responsibility for crimes on a doctrine of joint criminal enterprise against Croats. Were Croats driven by any shape or form by the alleged joint criminal enterprise would they, instead of Muslims/Bosniaks not have been the attackers in the first instances that led to full out war?!

ICTY’s finding regarding Croats and joint criminal enterprise to do with Herceg-Bosna and Bosnia and Herzegovina as a whole, really, could not be further away from the truth, from the facts, and it must be reacted to with outrage.

What ensued in the Appeals Chamber of in The Hague on Wednesday 29 November 2017 regarding judgment against six Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina (Jadranko Prlić, Bruno Stojić, Slobodan Praljak, Milivoj Petković, Valentin Ćorić and Berislav Pušić) is nothing short of outrage. Outrage pointed at the UN Tribunal that, in majority opinion from the bench, disregarded facts and evidence, which, if given due evidentiary weight, would give them no option but to overturn the 2013 Trial Chamber verdict of joint criminal enterprise. But, its not far-fetched to conclude that the ICTY has made up its mind a long time ago to brand Croatia and Croatians including the Croatian Defence Council (HVO) defending themselves from brutal aggression by both Serbs and later from Bosniak (Muslims) onslaught in early 1990’s as aggressors rather than defenders. That political agenda had been set a long time ago, including with the cunningly executed help by the former president of communist Yugoslavia Stjepan Mesic whose corrupt and perverse fabrications of false political agendas evidently made an impact with ICTY that would see Croatia be equated to Serbia when it comes to aggression. Yugoslav communists have never forgiven Croatian people for establishing an independent and democratic state, for seceding from communist Yugoslavia and last week, at The Hague, the world saw a victory of communist lies.

The indisputable fact is that both Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina were the victims of a Serbian aggression that sought to create a Greater Serbia. “During wartime events in Bosnia and Herzegovina there was not a joint criminal enterprise on the Croatian side nor was there any idea that would include actions that are not in accordance with the international legal order. It should be emphasised that Croatia is the most responsible for the establishment and survival of Bosnia and Herzegovina as an independent country,” said a statement by Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic
Photo: Screenshot

In its first reaction to the ICTY joint criminal enterprise verdict the Croatian government said that many of the allegations in the verdict handed down by the Hague war crimes tribunal in the case of six Bosnian Croat wartime political and military leaders did not take into account the historical truth and facts, that those allegations were unfounded and politically unacceptable, and that it would consider all legal and political mechanisms available to contest them.

“The government expresses deep dissatisfaction and regret over today’s verdict which confirmed the sentences for Jadranko Prlic,Bruno Stojic, Slobodan Praljak, Milivoj Petkovic, Valentin Coric and Berislav Pusic. Many of the allegations do not take into account the historical truth and facts, they are unfounded and politically unacceptable,” the Croatian government said in a statement.

The government recalled the assistance Croatia had extended to Bosnia and Herzegovina when the Serbian military aggression threatened its territorial integrity.

The Croatian government has announced that it will proceed with plucking out parts of the ICTY Appeal Chamber judgment that are wrong and do not fit evidentiary facts and present those to the UN, Security Council with view to discrediting the judgment. This needs to be done post-haste and immediacy in order to stop the grave human suffering this judgment has caused and is causing.

Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic
Croatian President
Photo: Screenshot

Croatia’s President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović, who spoke Thursday 30 November 2017 said: “His (Praljak’s) act struck the heart of the Croatian nation. As the president of Republic of Croatia I want to say clearly and unambiguously that the court in The Hague yesterday did not pronounce a verdict against the Republic of Croatia or against the Croatian people in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Croatia was not the aggressor, but did most for the survival of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a whole, and the Croatian people were the first to resist the Greater Serbia aggression, defending their survival and the survival of Bosnia and Herzegovina as its own country. Croatia and Bosnia were attacked by Milošević’s Serbia and the Yugoslav National Army and those are facts. Croatia didn’t attack anyone…We Croats must have the strength to admit that some of our nationals in Bosnia and Herzegovina did commit crimes and they must be held responsible for them. It’s unjust that Bosniak and Serb crimes against Croats have not been punished in the same way…I call upon Bosniak leaders to do everything in their power to ensure this judgment is not abused, but that it be the end of one and the beginning of a new era… Regretfully, at the very end of its (ICTY’s) existence a conclusion jumps at us that the Tribunal has omitted to achieve its goal of bringing justice for victims of crimes. It placed itself as a political arbiter and not a judicial body… Croatia, along with the United States of America has done the most for the unity of Bosnia and Herzegovina …We will fight with all legal and political means for the truth and justice…”

Well, no, the ICTY did not deliver a verdict against Croatia or Croatian people specifically but the effects and the meaning of the verdict are exactly that. As it stands, the verdict gives a certain licence for all manner of persecutions against Croatians in Croatia and in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the least of which are criminal indictments of similar nature against persons who have committed no crimes. Such an outlook would serve no other function but to aid the Bosniak plan for supremacy in the Federation of Bosniaks and Croats within Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is an outlook that is in itself criminal and utterly perverse, for it satisfies no justice for victims who perished by the hand of others, not of the accused. It’s regretful that the president did not reject the ICTY verdict outright or, at least, announced that she will do everything in her power to challenge it.

The facts to which the ICTY Appeal Tribunal in its verdict of joint criminal enterprise (that Croats formed Herceg-Bosna entity within Bosnia and Herzegovina with view to joining that part of Bosnia and Herzegovina to Croatia and in that name committed war crimes) wilfully turned a blind eye to include:

If it were not for the Croatian defence Council (HVO) – which ICTY has branded as the military component of what it says was a joint criminal enterprise – Bosnia and Herzegovina would not have been successful in its defence from Serb aggression nor would it have been internationally recognised as an independent state (beginning of April 1992 Croatia was the first country to recognise Bosnia and Herzegovina as an independent and sovereign state);
Croats and Croatia at all times maintained the resolve that the country of Bosnia and Herzegovina should remain as is, without divisions and continue as triethnic state made up of three constitutionally equal peoples: Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs. Croats gave decisive votes at referendum beginning of 1992 to keep Bosnia and Herzegovina as undivided and one state while at the same time the Serbs proclaimed part of the state as their republic, just as they did in Croatia the year before;
All humanitarian and military assistance to Bosniaks/Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina went via Croatia; Croatia enabled and carried out within its own territory and with own resources the training of various formations and hierarchy of Muslim/Bosniak army personnel; Croatia took over the care of over 500,000 Bosnian/Muslim refugees during the war; over 15,000 war wounded Muslims from Bosnia and Herzegovina were treated in Croatia’s hospitals and medical centres; – these certainly are no actions a country, Croatia, intent on being an aggressor against Bosnia and Herzegovina, as the ICTY says, would undertake;
Croatia and Herceg-Bosna were signatories together with Bosniak representatives to all international agreements during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina – neither was considered criminal then;
Bosniaks pursue the line that Herceg Bosna was a criminal enterprise that wanted to attach itself to Croatia – this defies all logic and common sense, let alone the facts that serve as evidence to the contrary – the fact that Bosniaks and Croats of Bosnia and Herzegovina signed the Washington Agreement in March 1994, forming a Federation of Bosniaks and Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina is one of these facts;
Croats and Bosniaks/Muslims fought side-by-side to defend Bosnia and Herzegovina against brutal Serb aggression; defending, for example, the city of Bihac in 1995 which, if not defended by Croats would have seen another Srebrenica/genocide of Muslims – the Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina actually called upon Croatia and Croats to intervene and help their defence against the Serb aggressor (ref. Split Agreement/ Declaration, July 1995).

Without a doubt, the ICTY Appeal Chamber had ample evidence to overturn the Trial Chamber finding of joint criminal enterprise against Croatians. No one would dare dispute that members of all three ethnic groups in Bosnia and Herzegovina committed crimes during the war but the responsibility for those crimes must be attached to individuals who committed them not to some flight of fancy of some doctrine that’s driven by a direction of a geopolitical gang and steered by opinion rather than fact.

Not a single person among the six Croats who faced ICTY Appeal judges on Wednesday 29 November 2017 had commanded, planned or committed war crimes.

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

And so if one wants to tell it like it is/was one cannot ignore the words spoken by Member of Croatian Parliament for the Diaspora, General Zeljko Glasnovic, on Thursday 30 November 2017: “…what occurred yesterday (in The Hague) was rape of historical truth and common sense…”

The very body that hands down justice, or is supposed to hand down justice, whose verdicts must serve civilisation’s standards, to reflect both historical and factual truths – ICTY for example – turns the victim into an aggressor! For political gain that serves someone’s agenda and it’s not that difficult to decipher whose agenda. We live and learn. We live and suffer injustice, we do not and should not engage in revenge because of injustice struck against us – we wait as the Bible says: “…vengeance is mine, said the Lord!” Truth will out! Ina Vukic

Is This A Joint Criminal Enterprise and Muslim Aggression Against Bosnia and Herzegovina?

Muslim Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina displays its mujahedin strength, Zenica 1994
(Photo first published in The London Times, 1994)

We have seen it over and over again: ICTY Prosecution is more than capable of building a case on shaky grounds for the so-called joint criminal enterprise against a group of people from one ethnic group (as this blog is about Croatia and Croats I’ll stick to that ethnic group) and bringing that criminal charge to trial. In the last year we have seen the ICTY Appeal Chamber acquit Croatian Generals Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markac (as well as Croatian leadership headed by Franjo Tudjman) of joint criminal enterprise plan and execution against Serbs in Croatia. In the last fortnight we have witnessed the ICTY Trial Chamber convict 6 Croats from Herceg-Bosna (as well as the 1990’s Croatian leadership headed by Franjo Tudjman) of joint criminal enterprise against Muslims. The ICTY prosecutors premise (malicious and dangerous delusion, if you ask me!) is that Croatia wanted to expand its territory into Bosnia and Herzegovina and by offering its military support to help Bosnian Croats who were victims of Serb and Muslim led crimes, Croatia became an aggressor against Bosnia and Herzegovina.

So, I ask myself: why has the ICTY prosecution not used the same logic with the fact that Bosnian Muslims brought into Bosnia and Herzegovina foreign jihadists, Al Qaeda operatives, mujahedins and therefore planned and executed a joint criminal enterprise – aggression within its own country. ICTY prosecutor used the country or citizenship origins of fighters in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the 1992 – 1995 war as a measure of aggression against the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, so if a soldier belonged to a unit of say army from Croatia that went into Bosnia to assist Bosnian Croats who were defending their lives, then that unit is an aggressor against Bosnia and Herzegovina, according to the ICTY, as things stand at this moment in time!

But, bringing soldiers/killers from foreign countries specifically to train and fight with the Muslim controlled Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina is not aggression, according to ICTY prosecutor!

Oh, please – give humanity and its intelligence a break!

ICTY has had a handful of cases for war crimes committed through lines of command or responsibility by senior persons of Muslim controlled Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina – but none of these (as far as I can see) had the joint criminal enterprise element spelled out, even though it is as clear as day that Muslim leadership of Bosnia and Herzegovina, headed by Alija Izetbegovic, did not bring the mujahedins into his army for a nice vacation! The idea of pointing a finger against Alija Izetbegovic for planning and executing criminal enterprise against non-Muslim people of Bosnia and Herzegovina seems to have fizzled away in some political cloud that hovers above Britain and the United States of America, who it seems, played a double game: condemned jihadists and Al Qaeda on the one hand, but assisted or turned a blind eye to Alija Izetbegovic importing mujahedins to train his soldiers in murder and to murder for “his” Bosnia and Herzegovina, which decided mid-stream (because up till then Muslims and Croats were allies in defending territory and lives against Serb aggression in Bosnia and Herzegovina), “suddenly”, to fight against Bosnian Croats in 1993. And what a vicious fight or conflict it turned out to be.

The ICTY Trial Chamber has not yet published the full judgment in the case against 6 Croats of Herceg-Bosna even though the summary of judgment was published over a week ago (29 May). Extraordinary! That being the case it’s difficult to comment on the issue of Croat-Muslim conflict as seen by the Trial Chamber through the eyes of the so-called 6 Croats of Herceg-Bosna case, but the disturbing public confession of a mujahedin Ali Hamad a couple of days ago upon being threatened of expulsion from Bosnia and Herzegovina and actively seeking asylum in Serbia, is opening more and more eyes worldwide to the fact how this aspect of Bosnian Muslim army during 1990’s war has largely been overlooked from the standpoint of international aggression. All it seems knew of it, but somehow, the Bosnian Muslims’ import of foreign jihadist forces has evaded, it seems, the theorists of and prosecutors for “joint criminal enterprise”!

Dnevno.hr reports that, according to press online, an officer of Al Qaida, Ali Hamad, citizen of Bahrain, who has this week asked for asylum from Serbia after he completes serving his 12 year prison sentence in Bosnia and Herzegovina for 1997 bombing of Mostar, has admitted to having personally during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, participated in horrible crimes by the “El Mujahedin” unit against Croats. His admission comes out of his remorse, her reportedly stated.

“The greatest number of murders were executed by the Egyptian Abu Mina,” Hamad said, “an officer assigned to security and special tasks. Mina murdered people with a chainsaw and with a large knife. He murdered prisoners at Zavidovici. He cut their heads off with an axe in front of standing mujahideens, and ordered us to impale the prisoners on stakes and leave them to die in terrible suffering…”

The Croat – Muslim conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina has largely been depicted in the international media (as well as the ICTY) as an attack on Bosnian Muslims.

Mujahedins from North Africa, Middle East, Pakistan, Afghanistan … started arriving in Bosnia and Herzegovina at the beginning of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, at the invitation and plan of the Muslim president of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Alija Izetbegovic. They arrived in the territory of Central Bosnia first, the areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina populated mainly by Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats. Mujahedins then started accumulating followers there and set up military training camps in the villages near Zenica, Travnik, Bugojno… They support and fight with the Bosnian Muslim forces, whose existence was threatened at that time and who were victims of the Serb occupation in Bosnia and Herzegovina. But the real goal of the mujahedins coming to Bosnia and Herzegovina was far beyond training or humanitarian tasks. Mujahedins shared beliefs with their fellow Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina – to come to the aid of “oppressed” Muslims and use the opportunity to strike at “infidels”! Create a Muslim state in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Does did look like planned aggression to you!?

Does this look like true joint criminal enterprise planned by Alija Izetbegovic, Muslim leader in Bosnia and Herzegovina at the time, and executed?

It’s known that the British battalion, within the UN peace mission there, arrived in Central Bosnia at the same time as first mujahedins.

Only a few months after the British arrived a merciless conflict between Croats and Muslims erupted in the area. Incidentally or not, recruiters of mujahedins for the Army of Bosnia and Heerzegovina also came from Britain; British citizens… Mujahedins take part in military operations of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Muslim). They commit untold atrocities against the Croatian population, using their well known brutal signatures – blood letting, destroying peoples’ faces, heart extraction, beheading.

The Islamist, jihadist connections of the Izetbegovic government are one of the most overlooked – or deliberately ignored – facts of the Bosnian War. It certainly continues to be so, unless the full judgment from ICTY Trial Chamber against 6 Croats of Herceg-Bosna actually opens new windows for justice, instead of playing politics and collective guilt.

Ali Hamad was a witness for the prosecution before the ICTY Trial against the commander of the Main Staff of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina Bosniak General Rasim Delic, and Hamad’s testimony went largely undisputed and he said that authorities all knew about the crimes of mujahedin and their connections with the Bosniak (Muslim) politicians and officers.

And now this week Ali Hamad confesses he committed war crimes in Bosnia and Herzegovina as part of mujahedins, part of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina. I hope that his wish to be extradited to Serbia upon completion of his prison sentence in Bosnia and Herzegovina for bombing of Mostar in 1992 will not be granted. I hope that work has already begun at Bosnia and Herzegovina’s public prosecutor’s office, at least, on compiling criminal charges for war crimes and participation in Muslim joint criminal enterprise against non-Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Ina Vukic, Prof. (Zgb); B.A., M.A.Ps. (Syd)