KILLINGS OF SERBS IN GREĐANI AND ČOVAC REMAIN UNPUNISHED 35 YEARS LATER

BANJA LUKA, SEPTEMBER 5 /SRNA/ — Members of the Croatian paramilitary formation known as the "Tigers" carried out a brutal massacre on this day in 1991, killing dozens of Serb civilians and territorial defense members in the village of Gređani near Okučani in western Slavonia. Many of those killed are still listed as missing, while no one responsible has been brought to justice.

The Croatian paramilitary forces entered the Serb villages of Gređani and Čovac after the withdrawal of the former Yugoslav People’s Army /JNA/ to its initial positions along the Strug canal.

The "Tigers" paramilitary group first entered Gređani at around 10 p.m. on the night of September 5-6, approaching from the direction of the villages of Mlaka and Novi Varoš. After disarming the village guard, they carried out a massacre of Serb civilians.

The author of this article, who witnessed the events, gave written statements about them to representatives of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia /ICTY/ on two occasions, hoping that those responsible would eventually face justice. His father, Rajko, was also taken away that night in an unknown direction and has never been found.

He remembers the cries and moans of the wounded during that horrific night, when bursts of gunfire could be heard at intervals. The following day, he said, the scale of the atrocity became apparent, with the bodies of elderly men and women found massacred.

According to him, the Croatian paramilitary forces killed Simo Zjalić, Milko and Rado Gaćeša, Dragica Čalić, Ljubica Zjalić, Ostoja Miladinović, Milan Keser, Rajko Gljivica, Rajko Savić and many others from the neighboring village of Čovac.

He stated he helped villagers who had survived the massacre by chance to treat the wounded and bury the dead, as well as livestock that had been slaughtered near the village fields.

The Croatian paramilitary forces that attacked Gređani left behind widespread destruction: bullet-riddled houses and windows, broken doors, belongings scattered throughout homes, and the names of the "Tigers" unit and the Ustasha letter "U" spray-painted on facades, along with messages reading, "We will return."

One territorial defense member, whose name is being withheld to protect his family, was tortured by Croatian fighters, who then threw his body into the village cemetery and covered it with wreaths.

After western Slavonia fell to Croatian armed forces during Operation "Flash" in 1995, one of the Croatian fighters who had been in Gređani on the night of September 5, 1991, contacted the parents of the slain territorial defense member. He boasted that he had personally killed their son and showed them the victim's identity documents as proof.

No one has ever been held accountable for this crime, either before Croatian courts or the ICTY.

In an attempt to conceal crimes committed against Serbs in western Slavonia, Croatia granted many Serb returnee families the status of civilian war victims for their relatives killed in 1991, claiming that they had been "killed by Chetniks" rather than by Croatian paramilitary groups and soldiers.

Older residents of western Slavonia say they suffered a fate similar to that of 1941, when Pavelić’s Ustasha forces with the help of their neighbors, killed them on their doorsteps and took them to the Stara Gradiška, Jasenovac and Mlaka death camps.

The ICTY never conducted an intensive investigation into crimes committed against Serbs in western Slavonia in 1991 and 1995, while the Croatian judiciary continues to remain silent on these horrific crimes.

On October 27, 2013, Pakrac-Slavonia Bishop Jovan consecrated a memorial plaque in Gređani near Okučani commemorating 18 Serbs from the village who were killed between 1991 and 1995. The plaque was installed in the old section of the Church of St. Petka.

The names inscribed on the memorial plaque are Draginja and Đuro Čalić, Milko and Rado Gaćeša, Rajko Gljivica, Savo Jagličić, Milan and Siniša Keser, Rajko Savić, Obrad Kovačević, Nikola Kuzmić, Ilija Kužeta, Ignjatija Ružić, Ostoja Miladinović, Vojislav Nikšić, Jovan Radujković, and Simo and Ljubica Zjalić.

The Church of St. Petka, built in 1752, was destroyed during the Second World War. Construction of a new church began after the war but was never completed.