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Comment: This is a contentious topic that can be very emotionally charged, so I want the editor to know that I am not minimizing the damage that was done during the war to the community. Additionally information, history and sources are often couched in bias based on political or ethnicity lines. That being said, this is probably a notable topic, but struggles with wording and sources that lean toward a one-sided view of events. Words like "luckily" or "liberated" or "survived a great Golgotha" or "cheated on the agreement" are not neutral language, even if the sentiment may be true. With the last statement (and many statements in the article), you need reliable sources to back up those statements. The article seems to shift from a number of different events: Laying down the background for the events is good (talking about previous actions of the NDH in WWII), but needs to be reworded to show that this is not the massacres that the article will be focusing on. From there, the article talks about the Croats in 1992 and then from the Croats and the ARBiH in 1994. I think it would probably be better to focus on one rather than the other. Sourcing: I don't know that sources like Slobodan Milosevic.org or Veritas are considered fully reliable sources without attributing them as pro-Serb sources. There is certainly a lot more that can be said and done here to bring this up to the mainspace, but I will leave it at that for now. I have nothing more to say on this topic. If the editor has additional questions or concerns, I would suggest reaching out to the neutral point-of-view noticeboard and the Reliable sources noticeboard to get uninvolved editors opinions on how to fix this topic. Bkissin (talk) 19:03, 16 September 2024 (UTC)
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The Kupres ethnic cleansing is the name for the organized ethnic cleansing of Serbs during April 1992. in the municipality of Kupres, by the leading members of HV and HVO. In this massacre 54–72 Serbian civilians were killed.[1] But luckily[neutrality is disputed], the JNA defeated the Croats in the battle of Kupres (1992) on April 11 and thus saved even more Serbian lives.[2][3]
| Kupres ethnic cleansing | |
|---|---|
Kupres on the map of Bosnia and Herzegovina | |
| Location | Kupres, Bosnia and Herzegovina |
| Date | 3–10, April 1992 |
| Target | Bosnian Serbs |
Attack type | Mass killing |
| Deaths | 72 |
| Perpetrators | Croatian Defence Council and Croatian Army |
Background
editKupres is a small town in the southwestern part of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In the municipality of Kupres, the Kupreška Plateau is located at 1,200 meters above sea level, and covers more than 550 km2. The Kupreška plateau has an important geo-strategic position in Bosnia and Herzegovina because one of the three roads connecting central Bosnia and Herzegovina passes through it. Serbs were the majority in that area for centuries.[citation needed]
The massacres of Serbs in Bugojno and Kupres were carried out on Vidovdan and Elijah day in 1941. The killed and slaughtered were thrown into pits. Fra Mirko Radoš was the main organizer of the Ustaše action against the Serbs in the vicinity of Kupres. The Ustaše crimes committed in August 1941 against the Serbs in the village of Malovan, about 70 people, women and children were killed, were committed mainly at the request of the parish priest Fr. Radoš. During the Second World War, the Ustaše killed 1,038 Serbs in Kupres, of which 255 were children under the age of 10. While the Serbs mostly fought as partisans, around 500 of them died as NOR fighters.
Even the genocide that was carried out against the Serbs in the territory of the NDH in the Second World War failed to disrupt the Serbian majority in Kupres.[neutrality is disputed] Land ownership, according to cadastral data after 1946 in the municipality of Kupres, more than 70% were Serbian.[citation needed] According to the 1991 census, in Bosnia, Serbs made up more than 50% of the population, Croats 38% and Muslims 7%. In the local multiparty elections in November 1990. In Bosnia, the Serbs won the majority in Kupres and formed the government.[4]
When the war in Croatia started in the summer of 1991, a number of young Croats went to Croatia to fight on the Vukovar battlefield against the Serbs and the JNA . Then the illegal arming of Bosnian Croats in Kupres began, and the paramilitary units HVO and HOS were formed, under the direct supervision of HDZ Kupres.[neutrality is disputed] The Crisis Staff was also formed, and a little later the Operational Staff of the TO, with its sub-staffs. They were well armed and threatened their Serb neighbors with liquidations every day.[citation needed] They marked Serbian houses with special marks, as during the NDH. On 30 March 1992, Božo Rajić, president of HDZ Kupres, informed Gojko Šušek, Croatian Defense Minister, as well as Stjepan Kljujić, president of HDZ Bosnia, about the situation in Kupres, with the comment that the ethnic cleansing of Serbs could begin.[5]
March 1992. Croats, and later Muslims, from Kupres and its surroundings took their wives and children out of town, and only armed men remain in Kupres. At the end of March 1992, armed Croatian soldiers were often seen in Kupres, which caused great fear among Serbs, because there was a justified fear of a repeat of the genocide from the time of the NDH. Checkpoints are set up on all important roads controlled by HVO and HOS members. They still break into businesses and post their guards there.[6]
Operations and killings
editApril 3 1992 in the morning hours from the direction of the village of Malovan, which is 12km from Kupres, detonations and gunfire were heard. Members of the HVO and HV invade Serbian villages in Kupres and killed Serbian civilians they found, or took them to camps: Lora, Ljubuški, Zadar... at the same time they burn Serbian houses. The plague of those villages began.
One of the attacks that took place on 3 April 1992, it was from the direction of the Croatian village of Šujica by members of the HV and HVO units, as well as local Croats in Šujica who wore black uniforms and the "U" sign, like the Ustaše in the Second world war. They caught locals who did not manage to escape and thry were killed in their houses. At least 20 Serbs were killed in Donji Malovan.[7]
The attack on Kupres on April 3, 1992 was carried out by the Armed Forces of the Republic of Croatia, together with paramilitary formations, which was organized by the leadership of the HDZ Kupres, Duvno and Livno, as well as the HSP paramilitary formations. The following units of the Croatian army participated in that criminal campaign:
- 106th Osijek Brigade,
- 101st Zagreb Brigade,
- Student battalion HV "Kralj Tomislav" from Zagreb
- Special unit of HV "Žuti mravi" from Vukovar
- Unit for Special Tasks of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Croatia,
- battalion HV "Zrinjski"[8][9]
This attack on the surroundings of Kupres on 3 April 1992 was carried out at a time when Bosnia and Herzegovina was still an integral part of SFRY. It is also important to note that at the beginning of April 1992, there were no JNA soldiers in the area of Kupres.[10][11]
On 6 April 1992 at around 12 o'clock, Kupres was attacked by members of HV and HVO from Kupres. The attack was carried out with heavy artillery, where they destroyed buildings owned by Serbs.
On 7 April 1992 the military forces of the SFRY federal state, that is the JNA, arrived in Kupres. Since Bosnia and Herzegovina was not yet internationally recognized, and Serbia and Montenegro did not declare a joint state, the Yugoslav People's Army was still the only internationally recognized military entity.[neutrality is disputed] They were led by General Slavko Lisica. They liberate Kupres[neutrality is disputed] and all its villages, and Croatian forces retreat to Croatia. They took several dozen Serbian hostages with them, who were placed in the Lora prison camp.[12]
Consequences
editThe Serbian population in the area of Kupres during the spring of 1992 survived a great Golgotha.[neutrality is disputed] The commands of the Banja Luka Corps and the 30th Partisan Division launched an action to liberate the municipality of Kupres at the beginning of April. Although the Army of the Republika Srpska was officially founded on 12 May 1992, the fighters and units of the JNA that participated in the operation were almost completely the bearers of the combat operations of the VRS during the following years of the war. After the arrival of JNA units and the liberation of Kupres on 8 April 1992, in Operation Kupres 92, the situation returned to normal. And the General of the JNA, Slavko Lisica, orders to carry out an action to find all the murdered Serbs, who were killed by Croatian units on 3 to 10 April 1992.
Life in the town of Kupres and its surroundings normalized as much as possible because the front line towards the Croatian villages was only a few kilometers away.
An exchange of prisoners was attempted on June 29 1993 in Čelebić near Livno, which was led by Mitar Marić, president of Kupres municipality on the Serbian side, and HVO representatives: Božo Rajić, Jozo Marić, Valentin Ćorić, on the Croatian side, with the mediation of representatives of the EU observation mission. But the Croatian side cheated on the agreement.[neutrality is disputed][13]
Already at the end of October 1994, Muslim operations started from the direction of Bugojno towards Kupres.
At the beginning of November 1994, the joint Croatian-Muslim forces (HVO and ARBiH), in the " Cincar 94 " operation, attacked Kupres again and occupied it. On that occasion, the enemy forces were far superior and numbered over 20,000 soldiers, while the Serbian forces numbered around 3,000 VRS fighters. This is the first joint operation of Croatian and Muslim forces in Bosnia after the Washington Agreement. After the second occupation of Kupres, the Serbian population went into exile, leaving their homeland,[neutrality is disputed] fearing revenge, because anyone who stayed in their homes would be killed and robbed.[14]
By participating in this action, the Croatian army created favorable positions for the later execution of operations Summer 95 and Storm.
After the Dayton Agreement in 1995, Kupres remains part of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Today, in Kupres and its surroundings, few Serbs have returned. Most of them are scattered around the world, far from their homeland.[neutrality is disputed]
The fate of the 14 Serbs who were taken to the Lora, Zadar and Ljubuški camps is still unknown today.
References
edit- ^ "Obilježena 21 godina od stradanja Srba na Kupresu". 2016-03-04. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2024-09-15.
- ^ Vasić Cinema (2023-06-11). Zločini Nad Srbima u Kupresu (April 1992.). Retrieved 2024-09-15 – via YouTube.
- ^ Srpska, RTRS, Radio Televizija Republike Srpske, Radio Television of Republic of. ""Veritas": Navršila se 31 godina od nekažnjenog zločina nad Srbima na Kupreškoj visoravni". BIH - RTRS. Retrieved 2024-09-15.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ "I-1428". www.slobodan-milosevic.org. Retrieved 2024-09-15.
- ^ "Genocide over the Serbian population in Kupres". Malovan.net. Retrieved 2024-09-15.
- ^ Bezruchenko, Viktor (2022). The Civil War in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992-95): Political, Military, and Diplomatic History. Strategic Book Publishing. p. 271. ISBN 978-1-68235-712-5.
- ^ Balkan Battlegrounds: A Military History of the Yugoslav Conflict. Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Russian and European Analysis. 2002. p. 136. ISBN 978-0-16-066472-4.
- ^ Srna (2013-04-03). "Izvještaj protiv 8 Hrvata za zločine na Kupresu". Nezavisne novine (in Serbian). Retrieved 2024-09-15.
- ^ "Zločin na Kupresu: Zbog čega ćute?". BN. Retrieved 2024-09-15.
- ^ Babić, Bojan (2023-04-03). "Из атласа злочина - Злочин у Купресу". Републички центар за истраживање рата, ратних злочина и тражење несталих лица. Retrieved 2024-09-15.
- ^ Logos, Aleksandar. Istorija Srba 1 - Dopuna 4; Istorija Srba 5, Beograd (ATC) 2019.pdf. p. 147.
- ^ Bezruchenko, Viktor (2022). The Civil War in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992-95): Political, Military, and Diplomatic History. Strategic Book Publishing. p. 272. ISBN 978-1-68235-712-5.
- ^ "Fokus.ba, 02.04.2012, Pokoljem najavili rat | D.I.C. Veritas". www.veritas.org.rs. Retrieved 2024-09-15.
- ^ "Малован на Интернету - Разгледница из родног краја - Новости, актуелности, фото-галерије, приче из Малована, наши људи..." 2015-07-24. Archived from the original on 2015-07-24. Retrieved 2024-09-15.