Category: History of the Serbs of Croatia

Croatia and Slavonia became a part of the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs composed out of all Southern Slavic territories of the now former Austro-Hungarian Monarchy with a transitional government headed in Zagreb.

After Srijem left Croatia and Slavonia and joined Serbia together with Vojvodina, which was shortly followed by a referendum to join Bosnia and Herzegovina to Serbia, the People's Council ( Narodno vijeće ) of the state, guided by what was by that time a half a century long tradition of pan-Slavism and without sanction of the Croatian sabor, joined the Kingdom of Serbia into the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.

The NDH had a program, formulated by Mile Budak, to purge Croatia of Serbs, by " killing one third, expelling the other third and assimilating the remaining third ".

The HDZ's intentions were to secure independence for Croatia, contrary to the wishes of a part of the ethnic Serbs in the republic, and federal and national politicians in Belgrade.

Their position was that if Croatia could secede from Yugoslavia, then the Serbs could secede from Croatia.

On 17 August 1990, the Serbs began what became known as the Log Revolution, where barricades of logs were placed across roads throughout the South as an expression of their secession from Croatia.

According to United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, around 125, 000 ethnic Serbs who fled the 1991 – 1995 conflict are registered as having returned to Croatia, of whom around 55, 000 remain permanently.

Croatia is inhabited mostly by Croats ( 89. 6 %), while minorities include Serbs ( 4. 5 %), and 21 other ethnicities ( less than 1 % each ).

Moreover, in Yugoslavia there existed the Jasenovac concentration camp ( August 1941 – April 1945 ), which was the only central extermination camp outside of Poland, and the only one not operated by Nazis, but by the fascist Ustaše forces of the Independent State of Croatia, the majority of whose victims were Orthodox Christian Serbs, Roma, and Jews.

** The final fighting in Croatian and Bosnian wars ends in 1995 with the success of Croatian military offensives against Serb forces and the mass exodus of Serbs from Croatia in 1995 ; Serb losses to Croat and Bosniak forces ; and finally the signing of the Dayton Agreement which internally partitioned Bosnia and Herzegovina into a Republika Srpska and a Bosniak-Croat federation.

** The Serbian Democratic Party declares the sovereignty of the Serbs in Croatia.

The coat-of-arms of Celje was selected for the national arms immediately after World War I in 1918, when Slovenia together with Croatia and Serbia formed the original Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes ( later Yugoslavia ).

Serbs inhabit Serbia and the disputed territory of Kosovo, as well as Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form significant minorities in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia.

Serbs in Glina, Croatia being forced to convert to Catholicism by the Croatian Ustaše during World War II

In addition, an estimated 120, 000 Serbs were deported from the Independent State of Croatia into the area governed by the Military Administration in Serbia, while an estimated 300, 000 fled in 1943.

The war in Croatia ended with a total Croatian victory with the Croats routing the forces of the Republic of Serbian Krajina and expelling an estimated 200, 000 Croatian Serbs from the country in the largest military offensive in Europe since the end of the Second World War.

Nazi-sponsored Croatia had a notable Serb community, roughly two million strong, which the Croatian Ustaše sought to eliminate through genocide: In the Croats ' political programme it was explained that " ⅓ of the Serbs were to be killed, ⅓ were to be expelled and ⅓ were to be forcibly converted to Catholicism " ( see World War II persecution of Serbs ).

* In Croatia, Serbs are the largest national minority, scattered across the country.

According to the 2001 Census, there were 201, 631 Serbs in Croatia, down from the pre-war figure of 581, 663, a result of the Operation Oluja ; the Croatian War.

File: croatia2001 Serbs. png | Serbs of Croatia in 2001.

The new, 1994 English title, included the then neologism " ethnic cleansing ", massively used at these times relating to the crimes committed by Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina of 1990s.

** Resolution 47 / 121: condemned ethnic cleansing of the Bosnian Muslims by the Bosnian Serbs as genocide, ( fourteen year later the International Court of Justice ruled in the Bosnian Genocide Case of 2007, that ethnic cleansing was not enough in itself to be genocide, but that there must also be intent to kill a substantial part of the targeted group by the perpetrators ).

According to his own word, his primary intent was to demonstrate with these findings that there should be no argument for further bloodshed between Croats and Serbs based on these exaggerated figures, that much of the revenge had already occurred between Croats and Serbs during the war, and that Croats and Serbs could continue to live together peacefully, as they had for centuries.

The Serbs and the Greeks had a military advantage on the eve of the war because their armies confronted comparatively weak Ottoman forces in the First Balkan War and suffered relatively light casualties while the Bulgarians were involved in heavy fighting in Thrace.

In western Macedonia however, the lack of coordination between the Greek and Serbian HQs cost the Greeks a setback in the Battle of Vevi on, when the Greek 5th Infantry Division crossed its way with the VI Ottoman Corps ( a part of the Vardar Army consisting of the 16th, 17th and 18th Nizamiye divisions ), retreating to Albania following the battle of Prilep against the Serbs.

The Clinton administration, by contrast, was committed to a policy of ' lift and strike ' ( lifting the arms embargo and inflicting air strikes on the Serbs ) causing tensions in the ' special relationship ' ( Douglas Hurd and others strongly opposed this policy ).

In October 1946, in its first special session for 75 years, the Vatican excommunicated Tito and the Yugoslav government for sentencing Stepinac to 16 years in prison on charges of assisting Ustaše terror and of supporting forced conversions of Serbs to Catholicism.

Sultan Murad's internal organs were buried in Kosovo field and remains to this day on a corner of the battlefield in a location called Meshed-i Hudavendigar which has gained a religious significance by the Muslims ( which had been renamed Obilić by the Serbs ).

Still, it remained a notable fortification on the route of the ancient Via Egnatia ; in 1354, the pretender to the Byzantine throne, Matthew Cantacuzenus, was captured there by the Serbs.

Efforts to include the whole of Bosnia within a new Yugoslavia effectively terminated by late 1991 as Izetbegovic planned to hold a referendum on independence while the Bosnian Serbs and Bosnian Croats formed autonomous territories.

NATO's decision to cooperate with the Kosovo Liberation Army was seen by Serbs as a pro-separatist stand on Kosovo.

The proclamation of the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs at Congress Square in Ljubljana on 20 October 1918

Following the dissolution of Austro-Hungarian Empire in the aftermath of the World War I, a National Council of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs took power in Zagreb on 6 October 1918.

Kosovo is a largely ethnic-Albanian nation ( Albanians 88 %, Serbs 6 %, Bosniaks 3 %, Roma 2 %, Turks 1 %), which seeks independence on territories long held by ethnic Serbs, including as part of Yugoslavia.

Common among the Kashubs of what is now northern Poland, and the Serbs and Slovenes, was the belief that if a child was born with hair, a birthmark or a caul on their head, they were supposed to possess shape-shifting abilities.

The Kingdom of Yugoslavia, which before 3 October 1929 was known as the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was established on 1 December 1918 by the union of the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs and the Kingdom of Serbia ( the Kingdom of Montenegro was annexed on 13 November 1918, and the Conference of Ambassadors in Paris gave international recognition to the union on 13 July 1922 ).

According to Orthodox Serbs, the 33 knotted prayer rope should be worn on the left hand, and when praying, held with the thumb and forefinger of the right hand.

The initial status negotiations focused on technical issues important for Kosovo's long-term stability, particularly the rights and protection of Kosovo's minorities ( and especially the Kosovo Serbs ).

The Serbs in particular did not agree and refused to vacate any of the territory they had seized in northern Macedonia ( that is, the territory roughly corresponding to the modern Republic of Macedonia ), saying that the Bulgarian army had failed to accomplish its pre-war goals at Adrianople ( to capture it without Serbian help ) and that the pre-war agreement on the division of Macedonia had to be revised.

In 1878 the Russians compelled a settlement of the conflict on appeal by the Serbs.

Elements of the KLA are also responsible for post-conflict attacks on Serbs, Roma, and other non-Albanians, as well as ethnic Albanian political rivals ... widespread and systematic burning and looting of homes belonging to Serbs, Roma, and other minorities and the destruction of Orthodox churches and monasteries ... combined with harassment and intimidation designed to force people from their homes and communities ... elements of the KLA are clearly responsible for many of these crimes.