We visited a hospital museum, a hospital from which 261 wounded were taken, tortured, killed and buried in a mass grave on the day the city fell. We stopped at a local market for a coffee and borek or similar to recover a bit before going on.
Then over the border, which has two checkpoints - one for Croatia, one for Serbia. Once across the border it is surprising that, unlike its Croatian counterpart, the houses in the border village appear untouched. There was no retaliation during the blitz as the Croatians were given no government support - no weapons.
As a contrast to the morning we spent the rest of the day sampling wines, first in an old winery in Croatia then after the border crossing and checking into our hotel at a bee museum near Novi Sad. Fascinating to hear the history of the hives and the winery, and to taste the various wines including the herbal medicinal dessert wines.
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| 2000 reisling bottles just waiting for us |
2 comments:
"Once across the border it is surprising that, unlike its Croatian counterpart, the houses in the border village appear untouched."
That's because the war was in Croatia: it was Croatia attacking its ethnic Serbian population and ethnically cleansing it. That was the design of Croatia's President Franjo Tudjman and the Croatian government.
There are even transcripts and videos of his military meetings where he talked about it. But it is ignored at the ICTY court because the U.S. (which was instrumental in setting up the court in the first place) was supporting Croatia and also helped them ethnically cleanse the Serb population.
The census showed that the Croatian Serb population went from over 12.2% just before the war (1991) to 4.5% in 2002.
So there were almost 400,000 Croatian Serbs who were ethnically cleansed and several thousands killed.
That's what the mainstream media is mum on.
Vukovar had a large Serbian population (and actually there are Serbs still there, but the town is divided in that you have separate Serb restaurants, bars, schools, etc.).
This population was targeted by Croatian police and death squads from even before the war officially began.
TOMISLAV MERCEP is a name people SHOULD know.
He was a Croatian death squad commander and he is free today. After Vukovar he was smuggled out during the "fall" and did his dirty work in Gospic, Croatia.
One of his right-hand men, Miro Bajramovic, said that he himself was responsible for killing 86 mostly Croatian Serb civilians. So just one man in Mercep's squad killed 86.
And I don't believe they were really hospital patients killed: I don't think they ever proved it with hospital registries or admissions charts.
Serbs claimed that Croatian soldiers went to hide in the hospital and got in the beds with their weapons.
There was also a huge amount of street fighting going on in Vukovar, and around the hospital too.
Those who died there could falsely be claimed as hospital patients.
The hospital staff all got out okay and without a scratch.
This included Croat nurse Vesna Bosanac who was said by Serbs to forceably take their blood for the use of Croat soldiers.
She was called the "vampire nurse".
She is an obese redhead and she is still around today.
Pictures show her without a scratch (nor meal lost).
So if the Serb soldiers didn't touch this vampire nurse, why would they hurt actual patients?
And even the ICTY admitted that virtually all those dead were Croatian military.
Meanwhile, the retreating Croat soldiers were pulling hiding Vukovar Serb families from the cellars and killing them.
There are photos of these Serb dead, and they are fully identified. They are civilians, not soldiers. And even one photo of a small Serb boy shot point blank by the Croat soldiers during the fall of Vukovar.
Also, a Serb farm family, including females, axed to death by the Croats.
The Croats started the war by bombing Serb homes, businesses, churches, and also "arresting" Serb only to take them to be tortured and killed.
There are photos of dead Croatian Serbs floating in the rivers. They are fully identified. I've not ever seen one of an identified Croat civilian.
I'll point out that Croat/Catholic churches in Serbia were not looted, burned and bombed.
The Croat population in Serbia was not mass-fired, unlike in Tudjman's Croatia.
Croat-owned restaurants, bars, homes were not burnt down either.
The ethnic Croat population in Serbia isn't large - I think around 70,000 but it is stable.
There was no ethnic cleansing of Serbian Croats nor systematic destruction of their property.
The Croat army had trainloads of explosives and they systematically dynamited Serb villages - there's a vast wasteland of obliterated Croatian Serb villages - places tourists never go.
They also tortured Montenegrin soldiers in Lora prison by cutting out their tongues. This was witnessed and testified by a Croat guard at that prison. He heard gurgling noises coming from the prison and then discovered the horror.
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