Bleiburg Memorial Day is marked on 15 May, however, this year, the commemoration will be held on 14 May due to local elections in Croatia, scheduled for Sunday, 15 May.
The mass for the victims of death marches in the wake of the Second World War will be said by Bosnian Cardinal Sarajevo Archbishop Vinko Puljic, while Islamic prayers will be said by the chief mufti in Croatia, Sevko Omerbasic.
Bleiburg Memorial Day is observed in tribute to victims who were killed when Croatian Ustasha and Domobran members and civilians were handed over to partisans and the then Yugoslav Army which killed many of them or forced them to go on death marches in the wake of the Second World War. Thousands of Croatian soldiers and civilians were killed, without trials, at the Bleiburg field and on marches back to the then Yugoslavia during their forced repatriation, after the Allies had turned them over to the Yugoslav partisan army.
Asked whether the organising committee would allow the arrival of people wearing uniforms of the Ustasha (Nazi-styled Croatian army in WW II), at commemorative services in Bleiburg, Vukusic said that the organisers could not forbid it, but that it was the duty of the Austrian police to do so. He added that he would call on participants to respect Austrian laws and regulations.
We shall do our best to ensure that the commemoration be held in a peaceful and dignified manner, keeping politics away from it, Vukusic said.
He said that he was expecting about 15,000 participants and that security measures were being stepped up.
Free transport for Croatian citizens is organised on busses that will depart from Zagreb in the early morning of 14 May.
An international symposium on the 1945 death marches and the Bleibirg massacre will be held from 11 to 13 May in the Croatian parliament, under the auspices of Sabor Speaker Vladimir Seks.