Croatian Serbs Commemorate Victims of 1995 Operation Storm

Commemoration for victims of Storm Operation in village of Donji Skrad, August 3 2021. Photo: snv.hr

Croatian Serb advocacy orgnisations and other human rights organisations on Wednesday started a six-day campaign to commemorate the Serbian civilian victims of the Croatian army’s 1995 Operation “Oluja” (“Storm”).

The operation terminated an ethnic Serb rebellion but also resulted in some 200,000 Serbs being expelled or fleeing the Knin region in southwest Croatia.

The Croatia-based Serb National Council, SNV, Documenta – Center for Dealing with the Past and the SENSE Transitional Justice Center, together with the Serbia-based based Humanitarian Law Centre, HLC, on Wednesday started the campaign to commemorate the civilians who perished during and after the operation.

The campaign is based on video excerpts from the interactive narrative “Storm in The Hague”, which covers five key points of contention between the prosecution and defence at the trial of Croatian generals Ante Gotovina, Ivan Cermak, and Mladen Markac: the goal of Operation Storm, the purpose of shelling Serb-held areas, murders, destruction and the plunder of property and preventing returns.

Operation Storm lasted from August 4 to 7, 1995, and saw Croatian forces overrun the rebel Serbs’ self-proclaimed statelet, the Republic of Serbian Krajina, RSK. It is celebrated in Croatia each year as a crucial victory and as a key factor that ensured the country’s existence as an independent state.

However, in a series of attacks during and after the operation, over 600 mostly elderly Serb civilians were killed, and around 200,000 Serb refugees left the RSK territory in August 1995, only some of whom have since returned.

Generals Gotovina, Markac and Cermak were tried before the Hague war-crimes court, the ICTY, for being part of a joint criminal enterprise to commit crimes against humanity.

Gotovina and Markac were convicted in a first-instance verdict, while Cermak was found not guilty. However, the two convicted generals were then acquitted on appeal.

The SNV’s central commemoration was held on Tuesday in the village of Donji Skrad, Barilovic municipality, in front of a house where six elderly civilians were killed on August 5 and 6 1995.

SNV President Milorad Pupovac (centre), Vesna Terselic from Documenta (right) at the commemoration for victims of ‘Storm’ in the village of Donji Skrad, August 3, 2021. Photo: snv.hr

Croatian soldiers killed Stanka Koncalovic, born in 1905, Zorka Gazibara, born in 1910, Kata Dmitrovic born in 1914, Nikola Dmitrovic, born in 1930 and Smiljana Koncalovic, born in 1942. Danica Dmitrovic, born in 1935, escaped that day but soldiers founded her next day, raped her and threw her down a well.

Vesna Terselic, from Documenta, said that, according to Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights, 667 civilians were killed and disappeared during and after Operation Storm.

“It is very important that the Serbian National Council organizes commemorations and chooses a different place every year because there are so many of those scattered houses in scattered villages that we do not get to visit, and it is important to stand by those who were closest to those killed and it is essential that we be with one another both in life and in remembrance of the dead,” Terselic said, Novosti reported.

SNV representatives also laid flowers at the monument to three Croatian soldiers who died near this village on August 5 1995.

Ratne zločine tokom i posle hrvatske operacije “Oluja” dokumentovali su FHP, Hrvatski helsinški odbor za ljudska prava, Veritas i Documenta. Prikupljeni dokazi pomenutih organizacija su bili temelj istrage Haškog tribunala. Nasuprot tome su komemoracije koje slave politiku 90.tih

— Natasa Kandic (@natasakandic) August 4, 2021

Rival state-sponsored events – a commemoration in Serbia and a celebration in Croatia – will be held on Wednesday and Thursday.

HLC founder Natasa Kandic wrote on Twitter: “War crimes during and after the Croatian operation ‘Storm’ were documented by the HLC, the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights, Veritas and Documenta“, while, “in contrast, commemorations celebrate the politics of the 1990s“.