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Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia January 13, 2006
THE GLAS JAVNOSTI DAILY UNCRITICALLY GLORIFIES “SERBIAN PATRIOTISM” - PRESS RELEASE -
The Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia calls Serbia’s historians and expert circles to react at the supplement “General Milan Nedic’s Speeches” the Glas Javnosti daily carried and circulated in the issue of January 13, 2006. The selection of Nedic’s speeches that it torn out of the relevant historical context and omits historical facts about the crimes committed against Jews, Roma, communists and other people during his rule is nothing but an attempt to manipulate the Serbian public to which war criminals are still presented as national heroes. Milan Nedic presided the Government of National Salvation at the time of Nazi occupation of Serbia.
Moreover, the anonymous author of the supplement claims that “all genuine Serbian patriots must hold in their souls and hearts” Nedic’s speeches that “teach them about their national duty aimed at saving the Serbian motherland and Serbia’s new glory.” According to the author, those speeches “stand for the sum and substance of genuine Serbian patriotism, born on Serbian soil and originating from Serbia’s heroic spirit and bitter experience of the present time.”
The Helsinki Committee points out to the following quotes from Nedic’s speeches that have not be published in the daily’s supplement:
“Hatred for anything communist is above all, and we are standing once again side by side, as we used to in 1941, ready to behead that red monster […] We shall destroy you, the communists, and weed you out.” (Milan Nedic, The Serbian People, January 29, 1944.)
Historians are fully aware of Milan Nedic’s anti-Semitism and crimes against the Jews, as well as of his glorification of the Third Reich. “Praise the Great German Reich for keeping Europe alive by defending European soil, its civilization and nations in the East. The red monster, Bolshevism, has given birth to communism […] Communism is a polluting thought sired by the satanic Jewish mind. If we are doomed, as they put it, let’s doom the whole world. […] Even your today’s suffering is caused by those pariahs of the God, people and Serbia’s name. Headed by the Jewish-Bolshevik scum of the earth such as Tito, Singer, Pijade and the like, they set your corn, your homes and your bridges on fire […] Our country sobs and wails because of that red monster wearing Jewish pentagram on their foreheads. […] I had invited you to join a holy war against that red monster. You have obeyed me. We have crashed it down. But there are still some renegades of ours, renegades of Serbhood, who intrude on this holy land. Slay them all, report them to the authorities and ask for help. The Serbian people are destined to fight the Antichrist. […] Now it is destined to defend itself from the Soviets sided with the Jews and Anglo-Saxons. […] (Milan Nedic, The Serbian People, June 26, 1943.)
By taking uncritical position on the factors of the WWII and Milan Nedic’s quisling government, Serbian nationalists encourage confusion among Serbia’s citizens about the basic tenets of European tradition mirrored in anti-fascism. So, Serbian nationalists (such as Kosta Cavoski and others) underline that the Serbs made a majority in the partisan movement that, in tandem with the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, is to blame the most for ex-Yugoslavia’s decomposition. Such argumentation contradicts the one claiming that the Serbs have been the strongest opponents of communism and that Yugoslavia was nothing but “a dungeon” for them.
The Helsinki Committee indicates that no democratic country would ever allow a daily paper with high circulation to publicize an article that glorifies war criminals from the Nazi era and thus incite hatred for the people coming from other nations and anti-fascist movement.
_____________________________________ Spomenka Grujicic Program Director Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia Zmaj Jova Street # 7 11000 Belgrade Tel. ++(381) 11 30 32 408 Fax: ++ (381) 11 636 429
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