Town of Royally Swindled

Anonymous HSP member in the party office: "Tudman invited us here, and now there is supposedly no space for us. The plan was that Serbs would not return to Knin... Our intervention group, that was a bit exaggerated. Terrorist methods were announced so that it did not turn out that the HSP was to be blamed for violence while humanitarian organizations are openly siding with the Serbs and working against us. We could block the traffic through Knin, park cars on the street, have women and children lie on the road, so that no one could drive to the seaside through Knin" - Anonymous café owner, a Croat: "People who came from Bosnia were swindled. They cheated me, and I was born in Knin, let alone them. Serbs come to my café. I have no money, and why should I reject Serb money."

by Damir PILIC

Feral Tribune, Split, Croatia, August 16, 1999

"Wait a minute! Tudman invited us here, and now there is no space for us. Now they say 'Serb property'. Fine, Serb property, but what about my property? I fought in Bosnia for the Croatian army and cannot go back there anymore. And now everyone is in trouble with those apartments, they do not know what to do with us. They say adequate replacement accommodation. Where? The state has no money for social services, let alone for the construction of new apartments. They were counting that Serbs would not return to Knin and now they are in trouble...

"I do not understand how all the factories in Knin could work during and before the [operation] 'Storm', and after the operation 'Storm' everything was shut down and destroyed. It seems that the HSP is now blamed for everything in Knin, and it seems to me that the HDZ is pushing that line, in order to deflect questions about the destroyed economy and the fact that we haven't received social assistance for four-five months and that our children are starving... This Association, our Intervention Group, that was a bit exaggerated. Those people gathered spontaneously, so that they do not end up on the street. And that thing about terrorist methods, that was announced so that it did not later turn out that the HSP was to be blamed for violence, while those humanitarian organizations are openly siding with the Serbs and working against us...

"We could block the traffic through Knin. About hundred of us could park our cars on the road, we would have women and children lie on the street, and no one could drive to the seaside through Knin, they would have to go through Gracac. But we said that we wouldn't destroy the tourist season, it's already miserable. But, lest it be forgotten, we can organize that in two hours..."

Announced Terror

The man whom we encountered that morning in the HSP local office in Knin, in Zvonimir street, was not prepared to tell us his name. He excused his reluctance with the party discipline and the obligation to get permission from the president of the local HSP. Everything ended with a promise that he would organize for us a meeting with the local HSP leaders in the afternoon. The Knin organization of the HSP has recently drawn attention to itself by the establishment of an Intervention Group for the protection of endangered Croats and open threats with terrorist methods, if the evictions of Bosnian Croats from Serb houses continue. The HSP announced that "the patience of the Croat people in Knin is nearing its end" and that further "irritating actions of humanitarian organization could provoke unwanted consequences, namely application of terrorist methods". The HSP started feeling first symptoms of "endangerment" at the beginning of the NATO attack on FR Yugoslavia, when the former inhabitants of Knin, Serbs who had escaped to Yugoslavia, started returning to Knin. During the last visit of Feral's journalists to Knin, about five months ago, the royal town had about 15,000 inhabitants; ten thousands of Croat settlers (about 7,000 of them from Bosnia-Hercegovina), three thousands of local Croats, and about 3,000 local Serbs (about a thousand of them were returnees).

Today, five months later, Croat figures are roughly the same, but according to the estimates of the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights (HHO), the number of Serbs has increased to about 6,000 (it should be mentioned that these estimates vary a lot, since some Serbs return to the Republic of Srpska and FR Yugoslavia, some Bosnian Croats return to the Federation Bosnia-Hercegovina, and members of both groups also emigrate abroad). Although Croat settlers from Bosnia-Hercegovina are still in majority the Serbs will soon reach parity. This is the essential prognosis of the HSP worry, as explained by our interlocutor in the local HSP organization:

"I go to Zagreb from time to time and am therefore aware of the thinking in these so-called urban environments. For example, I sat recently in a café with my friends form Zagreb, and some friends of theirs, and I talked the way I always do, but I realized that my friend seemed ill at ease. Perhaps there were Serbs or Muslims at our table, I do not know. I still cannot fit into that..."

Weeds of Intolerance

It could be felt as early as in late July that something was brewing in the royal town, when the police chief of the Sibenik-Knin county, Marijan Tomurad denied the rumors that the security situation in the Knin region is worrisome. In the conclusion of his denial, Tomurad asserted that additional nighttime patrols of uniformed and plainclothes policemen were introduced as "a regular part of Police duties" in order to establish the "satisfactory security situation", which was, the security situation, "absolutely satisfactory", in spite of rumors. Definitely, after such a denial, one cannot but wonder what was going on in Knin. Only a day or two after Tomurad's announcement, the Knin HSP issued the already mentioned statement, and in early August, the HHO president, Vjekoslav Vidovic, based on the reports from the organization activists in Knin sent to Prime Minister Matesa an open letter warning about the dramatic worsening of the security situation in Knin and its environs. The HHO explained increasingly frequent incidents and violent attacks by Croats, settlers from Bosnia-Hercegovina and Janjevo [Kosovo], on owners (Serbs) of the property occupied by these Croats by increased number of young Serb returnees, which provoked feeling of endangerment and insecurity among Croat settlers (since the permits for temporary use of houses owned by Serbs have been annulled, author's remark). That feeling of endangerment and insecurity was a breeding ground for intolerance, which is demonstrated through daily attacks, destruction of harvest in the fields owned by returnees, destruction of recently repaired infrastructure (electrical wiring, plumbing, etc.) in houses of returnees, deliberate attacks on vineyards owned by returnees and finally, physical maltreatment of the returnees. The HHO believed that the inter-ethnic tolerance in that region had reached a boiling point and warned that the situation was worsened by Djapic's HSP, and that local authorities led by mayor Josip Odak were not doing anything to calm the passions.

Both the Knin HSP and mayor Odak reacted to the HHO statement. The HSP asserted that they were not contributing to the worsening of the situation. Rather, the international organizations active in Knin were to blame because they "assist only the Serbs and give them a false hope that their situation will improve in the future". Mayor Odak only emphasized that during the last six months there were no clashes between Serbs and Croats in Knin and that the incidents mentioned by the HHO (Devrske, Kakanj, Varivode) took place outside of the town territory. "Odak was very brave in his statement," says Olga Simic, the chief of the Knin HHO. "It may be possible that the mayor does not have information about the events in the town, because of his obligations in the Parliament, but if he only tried a bit and talked to the people from the town, he would know more about clashes between Serbs and Croats in Knin. Individual cases mentioned in our report were offered only as an illustration and are an excerpt from a longer list of similar cases, some of which took place in the very center of Knin, exactly during the last six months. I want to emphasize that the Police really does complete its part of the job, but such incidents keep repeating." Olga Simic believes that the key event in the genesis of the Knin summertime inter-ethnic trouble is the meeting that took place in Knin in late April. On that meeting, members of the county organization of Croatian war veterans, both county heads, and Knin mayor Josip Odak unanimously agreed that the return of Serbs to Knin must be prevented until accommodation is found for all victims and disabled persons from the Homeland War.

"Wrong" Ethnicity

"That conclusion is directly aimed against the decision of the Parliament about the return of expelled persons, refugees and internally displaced persons. I know that our compatriots who came from Bosnia-Hercegovina have been cheated, that they were promised all sorts of things and received nothing, but the HSP statement indicates that they are prepared to use that Intervention Group to prevent the implementation of legal judicial decisions. I think that even that fact is sufficient for our intervention and a warning to Prime Minister Matesa and the Croatian public."

Ms. Simic complains that the Council for the Establishment of Trust has existed in Knin for more than two years, but that it met only a few times and that its activities have been inconsequential. Mayor Odak is the president of the Council, and we could not get his statement for Feral because he was not in Knin during our visit.

"Unfortunately, we've heard from Mr. Odak only when he asserted that the HHO and other international organizations assist only Serbs," concludes Olga Simic, "and that is also a way to raise tensions."

According to the chief of the Knin HHO office, even those settlers from Bosnia-Hercegovina who are willing to establish contact with owners of the houses in which they currently live cannot do so.

"In every hamlet where Serb houses have been occupied and where there are Serb returnees, there are cases that a settler from Bosnia-Hercegovina establishes a contact with the Serb owner, but when the Serb owner comes for the second time to visit his property, the Croat occupant says: 'I do not dare talk to you anymore.' Therefore, we are seeing pressure within the ethnic group. I have received such information from Orlici, Kovacici, Raskovici, Golubici... However, the original inhabitants of Knin, who are in mixed marriages and stayed here during Krajina are in the worst position: they simply cannot get a job. Their mixed marriages are highly objectionable."

Recipe from a Cafe

Knin is specific because many indicators point out that the original inhabitants of the town, both Croats and Serbs (including the returnees) are getting along much better than even "new" and "old" Croats. For example, Bosnian Croat settlers are convinced that the local Croats, because of mixed marriages with Serbs, are too soft with "Chetniks" [derogatory term for Serbs]. On the other hand, hard-line Croat nationalism of the new arrivals from Bosnia does not impress much Croats who were born and grew up in Knin. These differences in the approach and worldview may explain a recent incident, which wasn't even reported to the Police. Several Bosnian Croats noticed a "fresh" Serb returnee in a café and rushed to explain to him that he was not welcome. However, in a brawl that followed they ended up on the loosing side, since the owner of the café, a Croat from Knin and a demobilized soldier from the Fourth Croatian Guard Brigade, sided with the Serb returnee.

"All Serbs come to my café, just like anyone else. And why shouldn't they?" wonders the owner of a café (for easier orientation, a Croat woman born in Knin) who wanted to remain anonymous. "As far as I am concerned, I think that this is none of my business. The one who gave them papers to return should have worried about that. Why should not I accept money from Serbs? As far as the people who came to Knin from Bosnia are concerned, they have been seriously swindled. They cheated even me, a Croat born in Knin, let alone them. I came back after the 'Storm' when they called on young people to settle in Knin. Now, I am hardly making ends meet. People have no money to spend..."

Our interlocutor has a recipe for a new Knin. "The people from Bosnia should be somehow convinced to vote for the SDP. I believe that life in Knin would be easier then. It would also help if the international organizations started employing Croats, rather than only Serbs, since this way it appears that Croats do not need those two-three thousands of German Marks of salary. And there is no other employment in Knin."

"Everyone is having a hard time in Knin," says Ivica Simic, the vice-president of the SDP in Knin. "Serbs cannot return to their houses, Bosnian Croats receive assistance only through one of their organizations, and only for food, and they haven't received any assistance for six months already. The biggest problem for the local Croats is unemployment. We see the solution of inter-ethnic problems in Knin in the construction of new apartments. There is no other solution. Private property must be respected, but it is impossible to throw out to the street people who have been here for four years and were after all invited to settle here by the Croatian Government. These people use that as an argument against the criticism that they are violating the right to private property."

The HSP has also criticized the UNHCR, especially since the Croatian TV in its program Motrista [viewpoint] claimed that the UNHCR is distributing humanitarian assistance only to the Serbs.

"Those accusations are baseless," says the UNHCR spokesperson in Knin, Andrej Matesic, "since the criteria for the distribution of humanitarian aid are not based on ethnicity. The problem is that the amount of available humanitarian aid is decreasing, donations are falling. However, I would like to point out that the Croatian Government bears the most responsibility for the humanitarian aid and international organizations are only here to give it a hand."

"We Shall Set Knin on Fire"

The man from the start of this article kept his word and sometime in the late afternoon we met the "first team" of the HSP in Knin: president Ivica Pranjic, vice-presidents Marko Djapic and Tomo Cuk, and the former prisoner from the Knin fortress, Nediljko Parac Meho.

"The only solution is that they live there and we here," says vice-president Djapic. "There can be no coexistence with them. As far as those statements about terrorism are concerned, we only stated that intervention groups exist and that they spontaneously appeared in the field. Most of their members are also HSP members."

"We shall not allow those evictions," claims vice-president Cuk. "Ten thousands of us will gather and we shall set Knin on fire."

"No one has the right to order eviction of Croats from this town," president Pranjic is adamant. "Not even president Tudman. If we fail to stop the evictions, we shall move everyone from Knin to Zagreb. As far as our Croats from Knin are concerned, they lived with Serbs before [the war] and it is not easy for them. They now have to adjust to a different life, to adjust to us, and I know that they feel neglected."

"Now, they do not find it normal that I from Sinj [a Croat town] am in government, while before they did not have a problem with Serbs [from Knin] in the local government," adds vice-president Cuk.

"Basically, we shall do everything necessary to protect Croats here," concludes Pranjic, "even if it goes against the interest of Croatia at any moment!"

There are less Serb returnees in this article than the journalist originally intended. Many of those with whom we tried to get in touch refused to speak for the newspapers, even anonymously. Boris Mijakovac, a clinical psychologist by profession, returned more than six months ago and is consequently somewhat more courageous.

"It's not courage, it's disappointment," says Boris. "I have made a firm decision to go abroad. So much hard work and trouble and for what? It seems to me that there is no point. It is better to go abroad for five-ten years and then come back. I'd never go back to Serbia. I'd come back here, but in ten years. I am very disappointed. On the one hand some of my Serb friends in Knin still cannot even look at a Croat flag, but on the other hand it seems to me that Croats, at least the ones who settled in Knin, really have this extremist core that is stronger than all the efforts to receive Serb returnees and adjust to coexistence."

Escape from Wasteland

"The Serb heart in Dalmatia has been irrevocably destroyed. I go through villages around Knin and watch elderly women who immolate themselves with photos of their loved ones and families that they can never again pull together. I watch men who commit suicide with blunt knifes. I watch all that squalor and simply do not want to live here any more. I've applied for a job in the Social Care Center. I have all the necessary qualifications and now I'm waiting, out or pure curiosity, to see what they will come up with to reject me."

A joke circulates around Knin. It strikes us as a perfect illustration for Boris' story and a fitting end for this report. A Serb returnee comes to TVIK [the biggest employer in the Knin area before the war, company producing nuts and bolts] where he had a job before the war. He asks to talk to the director. The director receives him.

"Hello!"

"What do you need?"

"I worked here before the war and I need a job."

"No problem," says the director, "but now everyone is on the vacation so that there will be no work for another two weeks."

"Oh, that's fine," says the returnee, "that gives me enough time to go get my wife and children and bring them back."

"Great, I'll send my driver and a car to pick up your wife and kids," says the director.

"Wait a minute," says the returnee, "you're making fun of me, aren't you?"

"Screw that, old men, you started first," says the director.

Catalogue of inter-ethnic incidents in Knin

We Saw in Houses

Thanks to the cooperation of the HHO Knin office, Feral obtained a document with the list of inter-ethnic incidents (i.e. attacks of Serb returnees) reported to the center during the last six months. The list makes it clear that most of the incidents can be classified in two main categories (initials are used for victims, but not for attackers) a) attacks on Serb property b) attacks on Serbs.

The first category includes such incidents as broken windows or doors (two cases, both in Kovacici), forcing returnees to abandon their fields and orchards and violent occupation of the property (two cases, one in Kovacici, one in Zagrovici), sawing of the trees belonging to the returnee (two cases, one in Ocestovo, one in Kovacici) and one case of theft of the property belonging to a returnee (Knin, 8 Bulic St.), the theft of equipment from a business belonging to a returnee (Knin, 64 Zvonimir St.) and deliberate pollution of a well belonging to a returnee with oil (Zvjerinac) each.

Perhaps the most bizarre case from this category was recorded in Kovacici-Burum and reported by M.D (born in 1924), an elderly Serb woman who stayed in Knin after the "Storm". After beating up her daughter, neighbors (Croat settlers from Bosnia-Hercegovina) used a chain saw to cut in two her three pigs (each weighing over 200kg), alive.

Seventeen cases were recorded in the category of physical attacks, six of them in Knin itself. For example V.T., aged 88, was beaten up in front of his house in Deverske. He had three broken ribs. D.D. aged 15 was beaten up in the center of Knin. His nose was broken. Then there are 13 cases of "ordinary" beatings, including a strangling attempt and two cases of stoning (Kistanje and Zagrovic).

The list records an interesting case in which a Croat woman was a victim. M.S. from Kistanje (born in 1951) was attacked by two settlers from Janjevo [Kosovo], who believed that she was a Serb. They cursed and insulted her, threw stones at her and shouted that she "had nothing to do there and should go back to Serbia" (The civil court in Knin found M.S. guilty of "violating public order and peace" and fined her). The rest of the list includes specific cases such as pouring water from a water pipe on a returnee (M.K. from Knin, born in 1926) and arson in a Serb Orthodox church in the village of Mokro Polje near Knin. Anonymous threats, insults, curses and spitting weren't even recorded. Croats do not do that.

Translated on November 20, 2000