Protest against Ustaša glorification in Austria and Bosnia
Every year, co-sponsored by the Croatian government and the Catholic Chruch of Croatia, between 15.000-30.000 people gather in Bleiburg / Pliberk, a town at the border between Austria and Slovenia, to hold a vigil remembering the “Victims of Bleiburg.”
At the meeting, the Croatian NDH-State is remembered. The NDH-State was a Nazi vassal sate lead by the fascist Ustaša and its leader, Ante Pavelic. The NDH-State run the Jasenovac Concentration Camp, the only Concertation Camp in WWII, where people were systematically murdered without any direct German involvement. Around 100.000 Jews, Roma, Antifascists, and Serbs were murdered in Jasenovac.
This year, the large gathering in Bleiburg / Pliberk was impossible due to Corona-Virus restrictions, but Jewish Students mobilized against two replacement events:
In Austria, EUJS, together with the Austrian Union of Jewish Students (JöH), the KSŠŠD (Club of Slovenian Students in Vienna) and other anti-fascist groups, co-organized a counter-demonstration (planned since December, before the large meeting had to be canceled). In anticipation of the protests, the Croatian Ambassador to Austria had to lay his wreath at 7.15 in the morning, instead of at 10, like initially planned. An organized commemoration was thus made impossible by the demonstration!
“75 years after the end of the Shoah, we as young Jews won’t allow Nazi-Collaborators to be glorified. It is a scandal, that supported by parts of the Croatian government and ignored by Austrian politics, the murderers of at least 100,000 people in the Jasenovac concentration camp are commemorated ” said Bini Guttmann, President of the European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS).
In Sarajevo, where a large “Bleiburg-Mass” was held, the Bosnian Union of Jewish Students co-mobilized to a demonstration that was attended by thousands of anti-fascists, taking a strong stand against historical revisionism.
Find our Press Release in German here: https://www.ots.at/presseaussendung/OTS_20200516_OTS0045/diesjaehriger-ustaa-aufmarsch-in-bleiburgpilberk-verhindert
Find more informations here: https://www.no-ustasa.at/en/home-2/
