Croat, Bosnian Muslim War Crimes
Croat Blood Spattered Flash
Memorial service was held in Belgrade Church of St. Mark on Sunday for Serbs killed in the Croat offensive Operation Flash on Western Slavonija, in 1995. The memorial service was organized by the families of Serbs killed and missing in Republic of Serbian Krajina and Croatia.
According to the data collected by the fact-finding center Veritas, during the purge that began at dawn on May 1, 1995, in 36 hours 283 Serbian civilians were killed or went missing, including 57 women and 9 children. Over 70,000 Serbs were purged from Western Slavonija region. At the time of the Croat military offensive, the territory of Western Slavonija was under the UN protection.
War Crime No Bosnian Muslim Was Charged With: Bodies of Another 17 Yugoslav Army Members Identified
The Republic of Srpska Office for Missing and Detained Persons identified the bodies of 17 Yugoslav Army members. The bodies were recovered from the Memorial Crypt in Bijeljina, which is said to contain 80-odd bodies of Yugoslav Army conscripts killed in the Tuzla Column, all buried as unidentified persons.
The assault occurred on May 15, 1992, at the onset of Bosnian civil war, when a Bosnian Muslim organization known as the Patriotic League in co-operation with local Muslim authorities in Tuzla, attacked the column of unarmed Yugoslav Army conscripts as they were retreating from Tuzla in a previously agreed move to evacuate Yugoslav Army barracks and reach Serbia.
200 Conscripts and Officers Retreating from Tuzla Killed, 140 Detained and Tortured
Before the civil wars, Yugoslavia had army consisting of conscripts from all parts of the country and of all nationalities. These ethnically mixed units were serving throughout former Yugoslavia, in the military posts located in almost every city of each of the republics, including Croatia, Bosnia, Macedonia, etc. When the wars for secession broke out, first in Slovenia, then in Croatia and Bosnia, the Yugoslav political and military leadership decided to evacuate each of the Yugoslav Army posts where mostly young conscripts age 18-25 served, in order to avoid thrusting them into the civil war. A number of those young men lost their lives in these retreats, through attacks on their columns retreating from Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia. But the attack on the Tuzla Column was the bloodiest.
The attack on Tuzla Column had been broadcast live on a local television station, where it could be clearly seen that the shots came even from the hospital building in Tuzla. As many as 200 Yugoslav Army conscripts and officers were killed, and another 140 were detained and subsequently tortured.
Bijeljina-based Association of Missing Persons’ families chairman Zarko Radic said it was almost impossible to precisely assess the number of persons buried in the Crypt since the coffins often contained remains of several persons.
The Bosnian Prosecution says the investigation into the involvement of then Tuzla municipal authorities was underway. Nonetheless, no one has yet answered for the onslaught.
Part of the attack on the Tuzla Column, abuse and murder of the conscripts by the Bosnian Muslims is shown in the documentary “Truth.” While the local Muslim television was showing the burning column of Yugoslav Army vehicles, the studio commentator asks for cold beer and goes up another notch on the morbid sarcasm pole, informing the viewers they ought to “help out” one conscript he saw reaching the entrance of the nearby building.
A survivor of the Tuzla Column assault describes how one of his unarmed friends that was lightly wounded in the arm managed to hide in the entrance of a building, only to be handed over in a body bag six days later.