ZAGREB, March 16 (Hina) - Prime Minister Ivo Sanader and associates on Tuesday visited the Jasenovac Memorial Area, 100 km south of Zagreb, to mark the completion of reconstruction of the Jasenovac Stone Flower monument. He laid a
wreath and paid homage to the victims of the Ustasha death camp located there during the Independent State of Croatia (NDH, 1941-45).
ZAGREB, March 16 (Hina) - Prime Minister Ivo Sanader and associates on
Tuesday visited the Jasenovac Memorial Area, 100 km south of Zagreb,
to mark the completion of reconstruction of the Jasenovac Stone Flower
monument. He laid a wreath and paid homage to the victims of the
Ustasha death camp located there during the Independent State of
Croatia (NDH, 1941-45).#L#
"Jasenovac was one of the most horrendous execution sites and we have
no right to forget the crimes that were committed. We need the truth
about the victims," Sanader said, stressing that there was no
political objective which could justify crime.
Croatia's future must be free of radicalism, religious hatred and
intolerance, the PM said.
"There were many execution sites, tragedies and suffering in Croatian
history, and Jasenovac was one of the most horrendous. We, therefore,
will not and must not keep quiet or allow that the crimes committed in
Jasenovac and elsewhere under the NDH Ustasha regime be forgotten."
Sanader supported historians' efforts to determine the exact number of
victims of the Jasenovac death camp, saying that exaggerating or
diminishing the number was harmful and veiled the truth.
"The lies that there were 700,000 Jasenovac victims and the argument
that the Croatian people is genocidal served as the basis for the
aggressive Greater Serbia policy which at one time was opposed also by
the designer of the Jasenovac monument, architect Bogdan Bogdanovic,"
Sanader said.
He added that the 1990s Homeland War gave birth to present-day Croatia
which does not forget the past and is directed towards the future.
"May the Jasenovac Flower act as a constant reminder because of our
future, and the irreversible road Croatia has taken leads to a future
in Europe," Sanader said.
The president of the Jasenovac Memorial Area Council, Slavko
Goldstein, said the Jasenovac tragedy was twofold -- one occurred
between 1941 and 1945, and the other was represented by the
politicisation and manipulation with the number of victims.
The tragedy of Jasenovac and its victims cannot be overcome without
the truth, and the Jasenovac Memorial Area is helping overcome the
traumas, Goldstein said, adding that the actual number of the death
camp's victims revolved around 80,000, with 59,188 having been
identified.
Goldstein too commented on the reduction or exaggeration of the number
of the Jasenovac victims, saying arguments ranged from 2,386 to as
many as 700,000.
"The exaggeration of the number of victims led to the Serbs being
'infected' with wrong assumptions and becoming an easier victim of a
criminal political propaganda. Croatians avoided facing the truth,
which resulted in interpretations that Jasenovac had been a prisoners
labour camp. At the Croatian State Archives there are the names of
59,188 inmates, victims of the Jasenovac and Stara Gradiska camps."
Goldstein added that the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum confirmed the
victims' number revolved around 80,000.
Also today, PM Sanader visited the Jasenovac Memorial Museum which
should prepare its new display by the end of the year.
The reconstruction of the Jasenovac monument, erected 37 years ago and
damaged by the elements and fighting during the Homeland War, was
financed by the Culture Ministry with 15 million kuna.
Sanader was accompanied by Deputy PM Andrija Hebrang, Culture Minister
Bozo Biskupic, Parliament Vice President Vesna Pusic, presidential
advisor Petar Stipetic, representatives of the diplomatic corps, the
monument's designer Bogdanovic, ethnic Serb MP Milorad Pupovac, and
the president of the Zagreb Jewish Municipality, Ognjen Kraus.
(EUR1 = 7.6 kuna)
(Hina) ha sb