Sarajevo has once again proven that it is an anti-fascist city which has always been on the right side of history, Bosnia’s association of anti-fascists and WWII veterans said on Monday, expressing gratitude to the thousands of citizens who took part in a commemorative walk for the victims of WWII fascism as a Mass for those killed in Bleiburg in 1945 was ongoing at the city’s Sacred Heart Cathedral.
The Saturday commemorative walk was a response to the Mass which many Sarajevans saw as an attempt to revise history.
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Amid a Yugoslav army offensive aimed at defeating pro-Nazi and anti-communist forces, tens of thousands of mostly pro-fascist Croat soldiers and their families fled in 1945 toward Austria to seek help from the British army, only to be turned back by the Brits right into the hands of anti-fascists.
In and around the Austrian town of Bleiburg, allegedly thousands of the so-called Ustashas were killed.
The Yugoslav forces saw the slaughter they committed as punishment for the tens of thousands of Jews, Serbs, Roma and anti-fascists killed by the Ustasha during WWII.
After the dissolution of Yugoslavia, Croatia began commemorating the Bleiburg victims with a large gathering near the Austrian town every year but the event was cancelled this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The organisers of the event, the Honorary Bleiburg Platoon, said it will be held in different cities instead, among them in Sarajevo.
A number of Bosnian officials slammed the country’s Catholic Archbishop Vinko Puljic for agreeing to lead the Mass.
According to the Association of Anti-Fascists and Veterans of the National Liberation War (SABNOR), moving the Bleiburg commemoration to Sarajevo was a “political move.”
“We felt the need to remind Sarajevo citizens of all of the terror which the rule of the NDH (Independent State of Croatia) has committed in Sarajevo during World War Two. We didn’t protest against a religious rite but reminded of the glorious antifascist history of the city of Sarajevo and the innocent victims of the Ustasha terror,” said the vice-president of the Association of Anti-Fascists and Veterans of the National Liberation War (SABNOR), Nijaz Skenderagic.
“On behalf of SABNOR, I express gratitude to all the citizens of Sarajevo and to all those who supported us from other cities across Bosnia and Herzegovina for the dignified and peaceful walk through Sarajevo which took place without incident or any outbursts of hate,” he said.
He also thanked the media which covered the event, the police for the way the gathering was secured and their treatment of participants, and all citizens who followed the measures introduced to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
Sarajevo has proven that it is a city of anti-fascism, mutual tolerance and one where revisions of history will not pass, he said.
“Despite attempts to politicise both the Mass and the commemorative walk, Sarajevo has shown its dignity and its commitment to anti-fascism and the news about it has been reported by most of the biggest media organisations in Europe and the world,” he concluded.
