Croatia, which together with the Anti-Fascist Coalition defeated the evil of Fascism, joined Europe and the world last year in their efforts to mark this day and not allow that those horrors may ever be forgotten, Sanader said in a TV political broadcast on Thursday evening.
"This can be achieved and is being achieved primarily through school, nameLy through education," he added.
"The most infamous camps were at Auschwitz, Birkenau, Treblinka, Dachau, but also at Jasenovac, no doubt. This is one of terrible spots of the Croatian history, and we have no right to forget it," the Croatian PM said.
Croatia is not perceived by anybody as a country in which there is anti-Semitism. Quite contrary, Sanader said answering a question by the broadcast's anchorman about the alleged Croatian anti-Semitism and some information that certain anti-Semitic actions on Croatian territory were actually carried out by agents of the then Yugoslav secret agencies such as KOS.
According to a testimony of witness Mustafa Cengic, who used to be a KOS agent and who in November 2002 testifed before the Hague-based UN war crimes tribunal , the secret service of the Yugoslav Army (JNA) planted mines which damaged the joint Jewish grave at Zagreb's cemetery of Mirogoj in early 1990s ,and also planned an operation against the building of the Jewish community in Zagreb, too, with an aim of destabilising the Croatian authorities and inciting Jews not to trust Croatia.
"We have known from the beginning, we have assumed, and it has later been proved that all of this was masterminded by those who were against the establishment of the independent Croatia. This is now a historical fact," Sanader said.
He went on to say that during his meetings with international representatives over the last decade nobody claimed that there were anti-Semitism in Croatia. In this context he said that last year in the UN headquarters, representatives of several leading Jewish associations told him that they "are treating Croatia as an example where there is no anti-Semitism and that many European countries should follow the Croatian model".
"My cabinet as well as I personally are trying to raise the threshold of tolerance in Croatia and to thwart any sign of xenophobia, intolerance, any radicalism and extremism," he added.