GERMAN NAZIS AND USTAŠE CAPTURED KOZARA

BIJELJINA, JULY 17 /SRNA/ - After 38 days of brutal attacks, but also resistance from the Serb population, German Nazis and Croatian Ustaše captured Kozara on July 18, 1942.

During the battle, around 3,500 fighters of the Second Krajina Partisan Detachment, mostly Serbs, defended a refugee column of around 80,000 civilians against an offensive by 40,000 German, Ustaše, and Domobran soldiers, who were supported by Hungarian river boats.

Approximately 1,700 defenders were killed in the fighting.

The Serbs broke through the German-Croatian encirclement in several places and rescued more than 15,000 civilians, but the attackers ultimately overwhelmed the Serbian forces, who were heavily outnumbered.

German Nazis and Croatian Ustaše burned down all the villages, killed part of the population, including the 540 wounded, and deported around 60,000 civilians to concentration camps, mostly to Jasenovac.

It was one of the greatest ordeals suffered by the Serbs during World War II in the Independent State of Croatia.