Balkan Monuments Celebrate New States :: Balkan Insight

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BALKAN TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE

NEWS

02 Jul 12

Balkan Monuments Celebrate New States

Aim of the newly built monuments of the new states formed after the dissolution of Yugoslavia is to differ from the legacy of their former country, historians say.
Marija Ristic BIRN Belgrade

Historians from former Yugoslavia agree that all new states are trying to establish a new identity by building monuments to their war heroes and giving up on their Communist legacy characteristic of their former state. The debate on the role of monuments in the reconsolidation process in the Balkans has been organized by two German NGOs, Forum ZFD and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung. Hrvoje Klasic, a historian from Zagreb, said Croatia has demolished more monuments from the Communist era than other former Yugoslav countries. Our constitution writes that our state is based on antifascist values, but in the public discourse our society is based on nationalism and the values of [the WW2 Fascist] Ustasha movement, explains Klasic.

Photo courtesy of Forum ZFD

Senadin Musabegovic of Bosnia said that politicians in the region, especially in Bosnia, glorify the suffering of the people in order to unite them and use them for their purposes, adding that the ongoing process of victimization is the essence of identity-building. Politicians often use the term 'We are all victims' to create a collective paranoia that everybody is against us, especially our neighbours, said Musabegovic. Many historians see Kosovo's declaration of independence from Serbia in 2008 as the last chapter in Yugoslavias prolonged dissolution. This has resulted in the erection of a number of monuments celebrating Kosovo's independence advocators such as former US President Bill Clinton as well as Kosovo fighters, Artem Sediku, historian from Pristina, said. Monuments in Kosovo are simplified and one-sided. There is no representation of the victims [of the war], just the warriors and freedom fighters who are widely celebrated by the common people, Sediku said. Dusan Janjic, from the Belgrade-based Centre for Ethnic Studies, said Kosovo has a culture of transforming remaining monuments and not destroying them as it was the case before. For example when Pristina choose its first Miss Universe, they took pictures of her in front of the Gazimenstan monument [Serbian monument celebrating the Battle of Kosovo in 1389]. This is the example of appropriation of monuments of another ethnicity and not destroying them, which was usually the case before, says Janjic. Unlike other former Yugoslav countries that try to forget their Communist legacy and glory their fight for independence, Macedonia with its project Skopje 2014 is rebuilding its Antique past. This is the explosion and no one could expect that this will happen in this proportion. And this is not even esthetic anymore, says Macedonian historian Darko Stojanov. And it is not anymore about so called ancient Macedonia, now it is also who will have bigger monuments. For example we had monument of Alexander the Great dedicated to Macedonian people, but now we will have Mother Theresa, but larger, dedicated to Albanians. So now it is

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Balkan Monuments Celebrate New States :: Balkan Insight

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about which ethnicity will have bigger monument, adds Stojanov. Serbian university history professor Predrag Markovic says that it is pity that former Yugoslav countries do not appreciate the legacy of their former country since it had the most beautiful antifascist monuments. Antifascism embodied in communism has been replaced by nationalism. And the politicians do not help us since there is a deep confusion in our public of what we should remember and be proud of, says Markovic. Historians also agree that Balkan is not the only region that is facing this problems, explaining that Germany and France had similar one. But they note that French and German people tried harder and not built monuments together as expected, but at least they had joint history books.

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Balkan Monuments Celebrate New States :: Balkan Insight

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Americro

5 months ago

" Our constitution writes that our state is based on antifascist values, but in the public discourse our society is based on nationalism and the values of [the WW2 Fascist] Ustasha movement, explains Klasic. " Repeat a lie 10,000 X and it becomes "true." Klasic claim is absolute nonsense. Croatia as a state preceded Yugoslavia by over 1,000 years. Croatia is based on its long history and its absolutely defensive, anti-Fascist (fighting greater Serbian Fascism embodied by the anti-democratic, anti-non-Serb axis of genocidal and Nazi-collaborationist quisling movement) and anti-Communist (against the Yugoslav People's Army which was fighting for a re-centralization and re-Titoization and de-democratization in Milosevic's bid to Kosovize Croatia). WWII is brought up by the non-lustrated media and political hacks who actively suppressed and waged propaganda against NATO, US, Canada and Western Europe, who use the subversive (and wholly false historical interpretations of WWII) to obfuscate the dismal failures of their political agenda - this is sadly too easy due to the two foreign owned far left media conglomerates and the domestic, "former" Titoist regime propagandist turned neoliberal capitalist tycoon-owned media conglomerate (all of which were shadily privatized), which own more than 90% of Croatia's media. Klasic is yet another Yugoslav ultrantionalist-socialist regurgitating the mythology of the enemies of independence and democracy. The "destruction" of COMMUNIST monuments was the removal of the red star from them - which for the bulk of the partisan movements in Croatia, in particular in Istria, Kvarner, the Islands and Dalmatia, was common sense as well over 90% of those partisans were HSS and pro-democratic Republic Croats who took up arms against the genocidal Italian occupiers and their Chetnik MVAC quislings. If Communism is anti-fascism and therefore good; doesn't that make Fascism anti-Communist and therefore good as well? Or are both criminal totalitarian ideologies that should be equally despised, as Hanna Ardent's axiom tells us. I say the latter. Croatia rightfully removed red stars from monuments. It needs to remove any and all monuments to Communist party members as the Communists repressed Croatia, starting with the square named to that war/post-war criminal dictator Tito in the center of Zagreb. There is no room for any memorialization of any totalitarian regimes.
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Anita

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Americro 5 months ago

Atheistic Communism has absolutely no place whatsoever (beyond history's rubbish bin) in an overwhelmingly Catholic country like Croatia, and Communist monuments reflect those who lead to the forced imposition of decades of Communist dictatorship on Croats, so it makes sense to demolish them... (Serbs/Jews/etc. minorities in Croatia may have a different perspective of Communists, and, of course, Communist 'Yugoslavia' was not democratic, so minorities (especially Serbs) could have a grossly inflated level of influence in Communist Croatia, but that should no longer be the case in democratic Croatia... Also, WWII "Anti-Fascism" in Croatia is discredited by many Croats because of its association with Communism)... so Communism being forced on Catholic Croats was perverse, unnatural, and was never going to be widely accepted... It completely backfired on the Communists because it only hardened Croat nationalism (instead of softening it), and exported it to countries around the world, which ultimately led to the destruction of not only the 'Yugoslavia' Communists had re-created after WWII, but 'Yugoslavia' itself (which predated Communism), and, of course, the best outcome of all - the ultimate victory of Catholic Croats in taking control of an INDEPENDENT CROATIA...
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dan
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Americro 5 months ago 5 Reply Share

Repeat a lie 10,000 X and it becomes "true." - sumsup your own version of the truth :)

bob
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dan 5 months ago Reply Share

obviously, dan, you have trouble dealing with the past. and the truth.

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