THE SURVEY OF THE DATAE

Because of the orientation about the approximate number of the victims of the Jasenovac concentration camp of death, we are also adding this survey of datae of the official commissions and other authoritative persons that were dealing with the establishing the number of the victims of genocide in Jasenovac concentration camp including the period from 1941 to 1945.

1.  THE GOVERNMENTAL POLL COMMISSION OF CROATIA, ZAGREB

The members of the commission were:

1.  Vica Baranović, Administrator of the County’s Commissions for interrogating of the war

crimes.

2.  dr Zdravko Popović, Military-Court Departmant of the Headquarters for Croatia.

3.  dr Ante Premerju, major and permanently court expert doctor.

4.  dr Milan Majer, court counselor

5.  dr Ante Pecikozić

6.  Ivan Broz. District judge

7.  Bozidar Ognjenac and Stevo Trninić, court clerks.

After the investigation of Jasenovac itself, the opinion of the court counselor, medical findings and the interrogating of the eyewitnesses have been conducted, the State Poll Commission ascertains:

“According to the statements of the eyewitnesses, approximately 1.400.000 of victims was killed violently in more than four years of existence of this men’s slaughterhouse.“

The Commission quoted the following witnesses and their statements:

a)        Bing Julije, aged 39, a Jew from Virovitica, who spent time in this concentration camp, states under oath:

“I can’t tell you precisely the number of the liquidated victims in Jasenovac, but I believe that the number of people is even 1.500.000.“

b)        Živkovic Jovan, aged 30, a Serb from Bačko GradiŠte (Zemun County), who spent ttime in the concentration campfrom 2 April 1943 to 22 April 1944, states under oath:

“I don’t know how many prisoners was liquidated in Jasenovac concentration camp, but I know that the general conviction among the prisoners is that that number is over a million.“

c)        Marić Mihajlo, aged 27, a Serb from Bjelovar, who spent time in

Jasenovac from 31 October 1941 to 22 April 1945, states under oath:

“As the eyewitness and observer of the horrible scenes that were happening in Jasenovac, I can say with a peace in my heart that ther were 1.400.000 prisoners who either died of hunger or clubbed to death during the four years existence of the camp. Among them the Serbs were the huge majority, then Jews and Gypsies and a quite number of the Catholics as well.“

d)       Duzemlić Milan, aged 25, a Croat from Drenov Bok – Novska District, who spent time in the camp from 21 December 1943 to 1 January 1945, who worked in Jasenovac as a township recorder, states under oath:

“The reports that were coming from Jasenovac, which I went through, were telling that 900.000 prisoners were killed there. Municipal cashier Risović Stjepan saw the lists. Since I was the township recorder I myself saw those lists too.“

 (Commission record from 18 May 1945)

2. COUNTRY’S COMMISSION FROM CROATIA , ZAGREB – expert personnel. The report has been signed by dr Ante Stokić – the Commossion Secretary, and dr Venceslav Celigoj – Commission president.

The Commission report says:

“We are citing around fifty massive crimes performed by Jasenovac ustashas. If we add the number of prisoners to the cipher of the victims of massacres, we will get a cipher of 500.000-600.000 of the killed.“

The Commission cites the liquidation of III-C concentration camp:

It can be seen from the enclosed draft that that between so-called old-camp wires and a great wall on the north-east corner was a big uncultivated land where ustashas built an ordinary camp under the open sky.They fenced it in the barbed wire got settled around 40.000 Gypsies. They killed them in a few weeks time.“

 (The Commission report from 15 November 1945, No.: 4547/45, delivered to the International Commission for war crimes in 1946.)

3. ERNST FIK, general-major of S.S. German troops. He wrote this to S.S. rajksfirer, Henrih Himler on 16 March 1944:

“Party’s troops – ustashas disposed to Catholicism; they are undisciplined and poorly trained. As far as militancy is concerned they are partially unreliable and known for the fact that they took 600.000 – 700.000 people, who were differently disposed, to concentration camp and slaughtered in a Balkan way.“

4. THE COMMISSION OF FIGHTERS OF NOR (War of National Liberation), Bosanska Dubica.

The structure of Commission:

1.  Rade Knežević, construction technician from Prijedor.

2.  Rade Grahovac, Prijedor SOSS secretary.

3.  Reuf Bajtović, surveyor from Bosanska Dubica.

The Commission states:

“According to datae about the graves in Gradina and other datae on destroying of people in Jasenovac concentration camp, it is assessed that there were only 350.000 to 400.000 bodies of the victims.“

(A report from 25 October 1961)

5. THE COMMISSION OF UNION OF NOR-a OF YUGOSLAVIA (War of National Liberation of Yug.) is consisted of :

1.              dr Antun Pogačnik (Slovenija)

2.              dr Vida Brodar (Slovenija)

3.              dr Slobodan Živanović (Vojvodina)

4.              Zdravko Morić (Bosnia and Herzegovina)

The Commission states:

“On the basis of probes we opened and the number of victims we found in these probes, and according to precceded researches of the ground performed by the forensic medicine experts, we counted that the number of victims on the areas of Jasenovac and Gradiška is between 700.000 and 730.000.“

The Commission worked in 1963 and 1964.

6. Dr NIKOLA NIKOLIĆ,

The book “Jasenovac concentration camp of death, Sarajevo, 1975, writes:

 “The datae that 700.000 of people was killed in Jasenovac in four years time is not an arbitrary assertion at all.“

7. Dr VLADIMIR DEDIJER, historian.

The book “Vatikan and Jasenovac, Belgrade – 1987, writes:

“The publications, scholarly works and presses on the themes of Jasenovac and Stara Gradiška concentration camps that were published so far the ciphers of killed people range from 480.000 to 900.000 and even over a million. In most cases, the assessment of the number of the killed in Jasenovac concentration camp ranges around 700.000, and around 800.000 an Stara Gradiška.“

8. A CATHOLIC PRIEST MIROSLAV FILIPOVIĆ – MAJSTOROVIĆ, the commander of Jasenovac and Stara Gradiška concentration camps.

He stated in a court after the end of the war: “According to the stories of Max Luburić, the commander of all concentration camps in the Independent State of Croatia, who was probably keeping a file on the killed Serbs, around 500.000 of Serbs was killed in four years time“.

9.  LJUBO MILOŠ,

the commander of Jasenovac concentration camp, stated in a court after the end of the war: “ Undoubtedly, a few hundreds of thousands of people was liquidated in Jasenovac…“.

10. ALEKSANDAR LER,

the general – colonel of German Army and commander of forces on south – east of Europe, in April 1943 stated that around 400.000 of Serbs was killed in the Independent State of Croatia.

11. “POLITIKA“ NEWSPAPER,

writes on 31 August 1977:

“It was discovered another 117 mass-graves in Jasenovac and its surrounding in last year. Their number increased to 289. All of them aren’t discovered yet“.

12. LAZAR JANKOV, aged 27, born in Zemun. He spent a time in Jasenovac concentration camp from 13 May 1943 to 19 April 1945. He made a statement to the “Politika newspaper“ on 28 May 1945:

“I found out from the prisoners who worked in the concentration camp office that 840.000 of killed men, women and children went through concentration campregisters.“

13. JUAN CARLOS RAFFO, the Sorbona professor writes in his book “Error de persona“ :

“Ustashas killed 700.000 people (quickly and quitely) with the stick, ax, and long knives in Jasenovac concentration camp, a small place located on the bank of the river Sava“.

14.        ARMY ENCYCLOPEDIA,

quotes that more than 600.000 prisoners were killed in Jasenovac, and 75.000 in Stara Gradiška.

15. HERMAN BERNASCONT, the federal judge from Argentina cites Dinko Sakić as a commander of “Balkan Ausvic“ in the arrest warrant of Sakic, one of the commanders of Jasenovac concentration camp, and adds that around 700.000 men, women and children were killed in the cruelest way.

16. ZDENKO ŠARAC, the witness on Dinko Sakic trial in Zagreb, says:

“According to my estimate, Jasenovac concentration camp could’ve accepted 5.000 people mostly. 700.000 of people went through that concentration camp“.

17. JOVAN STJEPANOVIĆ, the witness on Dinko Sakić trial, states:

“I’m sure that 600.000-700.000 Serbs went through Jasenovac concentration camp during the time I spent ther, from August 1942 to April 1945. As I told you, all of them were liquidated. There were between 150 and 200 of my townsmen. Most of them were killed apart from three of us“.

18. SECOND INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE, “JASENOVAC – THE GENOCIDE SYSTEM OF CROATIAN USTASHA’S CONCENTRATION CAMPS“, that was held in Banja Luka from 8 to 10 May 2000, passed a resolution:

“In order to prevent the political bidding of numbers of Jasenovac victims, it is necessary to engage and unite all of our forces so that the identification of Jasenovac concentartion camp victims would be done according to their first and last name“.

The members of the conference visited place of execution in Donja Gradina where recorded numbers were 700.000 (500.000 the Serbs, 40.000 the Gypsies, 33.000 the Jews and 127.000 of the others).

(Dr Milan Bulajić, the book “Jasenovac in court“.)

19.        THE COMMISSION OF CROATIAN STATE PARLIAMENT, founded in 1992,  “established“ that that the total number of Jasenovac concentration camp ammounts to 2.238 persons. The commission didn’t cite the national belonging of the victims.

 (Nataša Mataušić, the book “Jasenovac from 1941 to 1945, a concentration camp of death and work“)

All estimates of the number of the Croatian genocide in Jasenovac concentration camp of death cannot be accepted as accurate ones, because the true namber of victims, no matter how much certain people have worked on it, will never be established. Maybe, that number could’ve been approximately consolidated immediately after the World War II, but the political will of Yugoslavia didn’t exist then. Actually, such a will could not exist because there was a dilemma between these two things: the accurate number of the victims of Croatian genocide over the Serbs or Yugoslavia in a prewar borders. The political elite of Yugoslavia decided to take another option. Disclosure of even the approximate number of the victims of the Croatian genocide over the Serbian people that was performed by the Independent State of Croatia would naturally cause the hostility of the Serbs, the most numerous people in Yugoslavia, toward the Croats, which would endangered so-called “brotherhood and unity“ – that was proclaimed, first of all, by the Croatian communists during the so-called “ NOB (fight for national liberation)“.

Keeping in mind that fact, the communists did everything to minimize the number of the victims of Croatian genocide over the Serbian people and designate the Independent State of Croatia as an occupier’s creation and outthrow “few“ crimes onto the ustashas as “a few degenerates of the Croatian people“.

In all public speeches, a Croat Tito and his loyal followers would mainly impute the war victims to the occupier’s army (Germany and Italy) on the occasion of unwillingly mentionimg of them, and the real performers of the genocide were mentioned only as the occupier’s assistants. Thus, they were being given second-class role.Though, whenever they mentioned Croatian ustashas, they would never leave out the Serbian Chetniks, putting them in the same position, what is, according to the history view, utterly excluded, because the Serbian Liberation Movement – Chetniks neither had concentration camps for anybody nor were performing genocide over anybody. That movement appeared in the Independent State of Croatia as a reaction on the Croatian crimes of genocide. The Chetnick’s Movement was trying to be as passive as possible toward the occupier’s armies which mainly sticked to the international conventions. They treated the war as the war of great states that were fighting for or defending their own interests.

During the Yugoslav civil war (1941-1945), the focus of Chetniks’ resistance was directed against partisans who had the illegal Communist party behind their back which main goal was to win the power in postwar Yugoslavia through force, lies and various frauds and deceits. The Communists suceeded in that by dint of various elecoral tricks and frightening and not through the liberal and democratic elections.

That kind of power brought Yugoslavian state community to desintegration and violent civil and religion war which lasted from 1991 to 1995 and had tragical cosequences for the Serbian Orthodox people mostly.