Vukovar Favorites

Favorite thing: Reconstructed school is waiting for the first students in the school year 2002/2003. It was totally demolished in 1991 during the Serbian agression. Every reconstructed building is rising hopes that life could be established again as it was before 1991. I know it sounds pathetic but this people here suffered alot and aren't much confident regarding their future.

Fondest memory: Sixteen years after the Vukovar tragedy, the feel is bitter.
No one was charged for the destruction of the whole town.
No one was charged for the thousands of people that were killed, wounded or disappeared.
The accusations of genocide were cleared off charges.

The only people found guilty of the whole Vukovar tragedy were two generals of the Yugoslav army who were found guilty for the tragedy that happened on Ovcara.

One was sentenced to 20 years. The other to 5 years. (>link)

So, in total - it is 25 years. For 260 deads.

That is 35 days in prison per one person killed in Ovcara.

Favorite thing: I hate counting people according to their nation or religion. I also hate proving that "this town or city belongs to this-and-this nation".

But since I can expect a comment on this page starting with "Vukovar was a Serbian town, and they were only defending it from the Croats" I will include some numbers about the national profile of Vukovar's inhabitants before the war.

1910: 10,359 inhabitants: 39,50% Croats, 15,70% Serbs, 33,80% Germans, 9,20% Hungarians, 1,80% others

1948: 17,223 inhabitants: 63,50% Croats, 25,50% Serbs, 0,30% Germans, 5,30% Hungarians, 5,30% others

1971: 30,222 inhabitants: 48,60% Croats, 30,20% Serbs, 0,20% Germans, 2,80% Hungarians, 18,20% others (mainly "Yugoslavs")

1990: 44,639 inhabitants: 47,20% Croats, 32,30% Serbs, 0,20% Germans, 1,50% Hungarians, 18,80% others

(Source: http://www.vukovar.hr/stanovnistvo.htm)

Vukovar was not a town of neither Croats or Serbs. Before the war it was a peaceful multienthnic town in eastern Croatia. It had quite large Serbian population after the Ottoman invasion in 16th century, and also after the WWII when mostly Serbs and Yugoslavs were systematically settled here at the place of Germans who fled after the war.

But regardless of the numbers and percents, I refuse to accept the theory that tries to explain the tragedy of Vukovar by the game with numbers.

No numbers can be an excuse for the crimes done in Vukovar in 1990s.

Favorite thing: "Modestly prosperous, sleepy, provincial town in eastern Croatia, near the border with Serbia. Known for its picturesque baroque architecture."
This was the beginning of almost all descriptions of Vukovar before the war in Croatia in 1990s.

But during the war Vukovar became more than a destroyed town. It became a symbol of all the destruction in Croatia during the war, of all the sufferings its inhabitants experienced.

Vukovar suffered a three-month siege by Serb paramilitary forces and Serb-controlled Yugoslav army in 1991. After it was almost totally destroyed it was occupied by Serbian forces in November 1991. Once a town of 45,000 inhabitants it was the most comprehensively destroyed town of any size in either Bosnia-Herzegovina or Croatia during the wars of the first half of the 1990s.

Destructions were also accompanied by the ethnic cleansing of Croats and all non-Serbs.

For the next six years Vukovar was under the rule of rebel Serbian authorities in so-called 'Krajina' region, and was finally reintegrated with Croatia in 1998, under the process of "peaceful re-integration" of Eastern Slavonia.

The reconstruction is under way. But the process is still slow and painful.

Fondest memory: There are many sources about the tragedy of Vukovar. I will include links to few articles in English found on BBC website. BBC is usually considered as informative and objective,

Vukovar massacre: What happened by Gabriel Partos
Vukovar massacre haunts Serbs by Allan Little
Profile: The 'Vukovar Three' by Tamara Kovacevic

Favorite thing: The house and memorial of Lavoslav Ruzicka, one of Croatia's Nobel Prize winners, was also destroyed (this is not his house; I had the photo but I deleted it not knowing it was his house).

Lavoslav Ruzicka was born in Vukovar of Czech father and Croatian mother. He won Nobel Prize for discoveries in organic chemistry in 1939. More info at www.nobel.se .

Favorite thing: Further down the main street...
It was Saturday afternoon, around 4 pm, and the city center was deserted except for our group. Don't wonder where most of the people were - they haven't returned to Vukovar yet. How could they? Where to? To these burned houses and offices?

Favorite thing: This was a family house, most likely with 3 generations living in it - grandparents, parents and children (such households are still rather common in Croatia).
Are they alive?
Will they ever return?

Favorite thing: Tennants of this apartment building were lucky - no direct hits, only shrapnels and bullets...

Can you imagine yourself living in that building, looking at the thousands of bullet holes every time you want to go home?
Some of the tennants have returned five years ago... that's their daily routine.