ZAGREB, May 15 (Hina) - Representatives of the organisations called 'Hrvatski Domobran (Croatian Home Guardsmen)' and the Association of War Veterans called 'Zagreb' on Saturday organised a commemoration at Zagreb's Mirogoj Cemetery
in tribute to Croats killed at Bleiburg, Austria, and during death marches at the end of the Second World War.
ZAGREB, May 15 (Hina) - Representatives of the organisations called
'Hrvatski Domobran (Croatian Home Guardsmen)' and the Association of
War Veterans called 'Zagreb' on Saturday organised a commemoration at
Zagreb's Mirogoj Cemetery in tribute to Croats killed at Bleiburg,
Austria, and during death marches at the end of the Second World War.#L#
On the occasion of Bleiburg Memorial Day, marked on 15 May, they laid
wreaths and lit candles in front of the monument erected at Mirogoj in
memory of those victims.
A representative of the 'Hrvatski Domobran' association, Davorin
Skrinjar, said that after an attempt of soldiers of the army of the
Independent State of Croatia (1941-1945) to surrender to the Allied
Forces failed, they were handed over to Partisans and the then
Yugoslav Army which killed many of them or forced them to go on death
marches, violating the Geneva Conventions. Skrinjar went on to say
that victims who died during death marches in the wake of the Second
World Two in the then Yugoslavia had been buried in more than 1,000
mass graves. He labelled this as a showdown with those who had
different political views.
After the wreath-laying ceremony, Mass was said in the cemetery's
church at which Friar Rajko Gelemeovic said that victims at Bleiburg
were a symbol of endeavours to obtain freedom and independence for
Croatia.
The central event of this year's commemorations marking Bleiburg
Memorial Day will be Mass and the gathering in the field of Bleiburg,
Austria, on Sunday, under auspices of Croatian Parliament.
(Hina) ms