PREBILOVCI AMONG THE PLACES THAT SUFFERED THE MOST IN WORLD WAR II

ČAPLJINA, AUGUST 4 /SRNA/ - The village of Prebilovci near Čapljina, where Serbs were killed by Ustasha forces, is considered one of the places in the world that suffered the greatest losses during World War II; this is why it is important not to forget their sacrifice, because only in this way can the victims of Prebilovci emerge victorious over their executioners, historian Dejan Škrivan told SRNA today.

Škrivan said that this was one of the largest crimes committed on the territory of the former Independent State of Croatia /NDH/.

"If we know that, of around 1,000 pre-war residents of Prebilovci, only about 170 survived until the end of the war, that alone speaks volumes about the scale of their suffering," Škrivan said on the occasion of the 85th anniversary of the suffering of Serbs in Prebilovci.

He said that after the crime in Prebilovci, there were almost no children, women or elderly people among the survivors, but rather those who survived were exclusively men who had taken up arms to defend themselves against the occupiers.

"It is important that today we remember Prebilovci and their suffering not only in the Second World War in 1941, but also in the last war in 1992, because in this way the victims of Prebilovci and the tragically killed teacher Stana, as a symbol of those victims, can emerge victorious over their executioners," Škrivan said.

The 85th anniversary of the Ustasha crime against Serbs will be commemorated in Prebilovci near Čapljina tomorrow and on Thursday, August 6, in the presence of officials from Republika Srpska.

The Ustashas carried out the massacre in Prebilovci between August 6 and 11, 1941, under the command of Ivan Jovanović Crni. Most of the victims were thrown alive into the Golubinka pit, while others were killed on the spot.

The only person who survived and came out alive from the school in Prebilovci was Mara Bulut.

According to her testimony, the Ustashas took babies from their cradles and smashed the children's heads against the school wall in front of their mothers.

A total of 830 Serbs were killed in Prebilovci alone, while no one from 57 families survived the massacre.

Stana Arnaut was a teacher at the "King Milutin" Elementary School in Prebilovci, and her only "fault" was that she refused to be separated from her pupils when the Ustashas tortured her on a chair in August 1941, abused her, and eventually killed her in front of the school.

After being raped and tortured, teacher Stana was slaughtered, and her pupils also suffered a horrific death.

There were around 110 execution sites in the Herzegovina region, most of them karst pits such as Golubinka, Korićanka, Jagodnjača, Pandurica, Ržani dol and many others.

The crime in Prebilovci was concealed in the former Yugoslavia, and in 1961 the pits into which Serbs had been thrown were sealed with concrete.

The excavation of 13 pits in the area of Lower Herzegovina began in 1990, and on August 4, 1991, the remains of more than 4,000 Serbs were buried in the memorial ossuary in Prebilovci.

In June 1992, during the " Čagalj“ offensive, members of the HOS and HVO mined the memorial ossuary.

The Church of the Resurrection of Christ in Prebilovci was built and consecrated in 2015 in memory of around 4,000 Serbs from Lower Herzegovina who were killed by the Ustashas during World War II, and the Serbian Orthodox Church /SOC/ canonised those victims in the same year.

This feast day was entered into the calendar on the date when, in 1941, the Ustashas brutally killed more than 850 residents of this village, mostly women and children, and threw them into a pit in Šurmanci near Međugorje.

After Serbs returned to Prebilovci after 2000, the remains were collected, and following the construction of the Church of the Resurrection of Christ, they were laid to rest in its crypt.

The church in Prebilovci was built with the assistance of then Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik and thanks to donations from Serbs in the Diaspora.

The Japanese newspaper "Asahi Shimbun" ranked Prebilovci fourth in terms of the scale of suffering in the 20th century.

The extent of Ustasha brutality prompted Italian General Alessandro Luzano to send Mussolini a detailed report on the crime committed against the people of Prebilovci.

In the letter, Luzano stated that teacher Stana Arnaut was raped in front of her pupils and that even eight-year-old girls had been raped. Luzano was appalled by the fact that a Roman Catholic priest had also taken part in the crime.