JASENOVAC MEMORIAL SITE
Jasenovac Memorial Site, with the Memorial
Museum, was founded in 1968 at the suggestion
of the Federation of War Veterans' Organisations
(SUBNOR) of the Socialist Republic of Croatia, then
part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
Jasenovac Concentration Camp
Jasenovac Concentration Camp (named after
nearby village) was a place of imprisonment,
forced labor and executions, primarily for the
Serb Christian Orthodox population which
was, with the goal of creating an ethnically
clean territory, to be completely eradicated
from the Independent State of Croatia, as well
as for Jews and Roma, who were
discriminated against by racial laws.
A large number of Croats
was killed in the camp as
well – communists and
Anti-Fascists, members of
resistance movement
(People’s Liberation Army),
as well as members of
their families and other
opponents of the Ustasha
regime.
Historical background - The Ustashas
The organisation called Ustasha – a Croatian Revolutionary
Organisation was started in the 1930’s in Croatian émigré circles (in
Italy, Austria and Hungary). Members of the Ustasha organisation
were usually supporters of the policies of the Croatian Rights Party,
whose leader, Ante Pavelic, had emigrated to Italy in January 1929.
During the years that followed, the movement gathered in strength.
The first military training camps were set up and a number of
terrorist operations carried out (for example the organisation of the
assassination of King Alexander Karadjordjević of Yugoslavia in 1934
in Marseilles).
After the collapse of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in April 1941, the
Independent State of Croatia was created, ruled by the Ustasha
movement with its leader, the Poglavnik, Ante Pavelic.
Historical background - Independent
State of Croatia
The Independent State of Croatia was founded on
10th of April 1941, with the full support of Nazi
Germany and Fascist Italy. During the four years
of its existence, the Independent State of
Croatia was ruled by the Ustasha movement and
its leader (Poglavnik), Ante Pavelic, who had
made plans for the extermination of the Serbs
while still an émigré. On 7 June 1941, on the
occasion of Pavelić’s first visit to Hitler, the
Ustasha movement gained the full support of
Nazi Germany for carrying out genocidal policies
aimed at the Serbian population.
The Victims
The essence of the Ustasha movement and its policies in
the Independent State of Croatia was embodied in the
foundation of Jasenovac Concentration Camp.
Jasenovac was a camp of death and a camp of evil.
The Ustasha camps were founded for the extermination of
certain nationalities, religious groups and ideological
enemies of the Ustasha policies of genocide and terror.
The Jasenovac Ustasha crimes were inflicted on tens of
thousands of Serbs, Roma, Jews and members of other
ethnicitys who lived on teritory of Independent State of
Croatia.
They were men, women and children.
Manner in which
prisinors were killed
Jasenovac Concentration
Camp was very brutal place.
Inside the camp there were
no gas chambers. Victims
were killed in primitive
ways, often with eye to eye
contact between
perpetrator nad victim, by
cutting victim's throats,
hiting victim to the head
with wooden mallets,
hanging, beating or starving
them to death and forcing
them into hard physical
labour.
Camp Jasenovac in winter 1942
Breakout from the camp
In April 1945, comander of the camp ordered the liquidation of all the
remaining prisoners. The camp and the village of Jasenovac were to be
demolished and burnt to the ground, in order to cover up the traces of the
crimes committed.
The last group of around 700 women was liquidated on the evening of 21
April 1945. The same evening, the camp commandant ordered the
remaining 1,073 men to be moved to the building of the women’s camp
(in the eastern section of the camp). During the evening, the group
leaders were selected and liquidated, and since the others guessed what
was about to happen, about 600 men, led by Ante Bakotic, decided to
break out from the camp on that rainy Sunday morning, 22 April 1945.
Ninety-two survived.
The same day, only a few hours later, the prisoners in the Tannery
attempted a breakout. Of 167 inmates, only 11 were saved.
Commemoration
As of 1966, a Commemoration is
always held on Sunday closest to 22
April, the day of breakout of inmates
from the camp in 1945.
Demolition of the camp
Demolition of the buildings on the site of
Jasenovac Concentration Camp began when
Camp was mined and destroyed by Ustasha units
as they withdrew from the Camp in April 1945.
Immidiatly after the end of the Second World
War demolition of the camp buildings continued
and every trace of the existance of the camp was
destroyed by the new Yugoslav goverment. The
last visible remains of the camp were removed
during the landscaping of the memorial complex
and the construction of the Jasenovac Memorial
Site.
Jasenovac Camp in 1945
Foundation of Jasenovac Memorial
Site and it’s activities
Jasenovac Memorial Site, with the Memorial Museum, was
founded in 1968 at the suggestion of the Federation of War
Veterans' Organisations (SUBNOR) of the Socialist Republic of
Croatia, then part of the Socialist Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia.
Jasenovac Memorial Site was founded with the task of compiling,
scientifically processing and exhibiting museum and archive
material concerning the Ustasha Jasenovac Concentration Camp, to
care for the memorial area and the mass graves of the former
Ustasha camp and, by telling the truth about what happened to the
victims of the Jasenovac camps, to build an attitude of respect for
human differences among young people today.
The activities of the Memorial Museum include co-operating with
survivors, projects involving exhibitions and publications, as well as
organising commemorative events to honour the Jasenovac victims.
Jasenovac Memorial Site during Croatian
War of Independence 1991-1995
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•
•
•
In October 1991, joined forces of Yugoslav National Army and local Serbs occupied village of
Jasenovac and Jasenovac Memorial Site. During that period Jasenovac was part of self declared
state Republic of Serbian Krajina and it wasn't controled by official Croatian goverment.
The building of the Memorial Museum was prepared for evacuation, but before its contents could
be moved to an area outside the war zone, Jasenovac and the Memorial Site were occupied on 8
October 1991. The museum inventory was transferred to Bosanska Dubica and from there, to Banja
Luka, both citys in Bosnia-Herzegovina which were controled by Bosnian Serb forces. Until May
1995, Jasenovac Memorial Site was inaccessible to museum staff and conservationists.
In a report by an observation mission of the European Community published in May 1994, an
inspection of the condition of cultural monuments and museums in the occupied part of the
Republic of Croatia revealed that the Memorial Museum was completely empty and that there was
no information on the whereabouts of the Jasenovac Memorial Museum inventory, but that the
memorial area and memorial itself had not been damaged.
In May 1995 Croatian Army started offensive and regained control of village Jasenovac and
Jasenovac Memorial Site. Special commission of the Ministry of Culture responsible for listing and
assessing war damage to cultural monuments confirmed the actual extent of the damage. It was
confirmed that 7,705 museum exhibits had disappeared or been destroyed, along with about 2,500
titles from the library.
Memorial museum in 1995
Renovation of Jasenovac Memorial Site
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•
Using the microfilmed library inventory and in
co-operation with the Republic of Croatia’s
Ministry of Culture, complete, expert
documentation was prepared as a basis for
submitting a request for the return of the museum,
archive and documentary inventory removed
from Jasenovac Memorial museum.
The Ministry of Culture and Jasenovac Memorial
Site sought the return of the museum inventory
with the help of international institutions. On the
basis of an agreement signed between the
Holocaust Museum in Washington and the
Ministry of Culture, part of the museum and
archive inventory (7,705 items) which was being
stored in Banja Luka, Bosnia-Herzegovina, was
sent for safekeeping to the Holocaust Museum in
Washington for one year, in October 2000, for the
purposes of conservation, restoration and
cataloguing. In December 2001 it was returned to
the Memorial Site.
Memorial
Museum
The new exhibition in the
Jasenovac Memorial Site
Memorial Museum was formally
opened on 27 November 2006.
Since it was impossible to display
all the museum and archive
material in a space of only 350
m², it was decided to adopt a
multimedia approach, i.e. to
present the museum inventory
using different media, including
photographic prints and
documents, glass cabinet displays,
digital presentations on screens,
audio-visual presentations of
survivor witness statements, etc.
New permanent exibition, opened in 2006
New permanent exibition, opened in 2006
New permanent exibition, opened in 2006
Education
Centre
The basic tasks of Jasenovac
Memorial Site are to preserve the
memory of the Jasenovac victims
and to teach non-violence,
democracy and human rights.
In Jasenovac Memorial Site
Education Centre, young people
are made aware of the
consequences of denying human
dignity. They learn to recognise
problems before they arise,
prevent and halt all forms of
violence and protect potential
victims.
International co-operation
•
Since 2002 Jasenovac Memorial Site has been co-operating with many museums and
memorial institutions in Europe, the United States of America and Israel. Through the
operations of IPAM (International Partnership Among Museums) Jasenovac Memorial Site
has established a good bilateral relationship with the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in
Washington and the Jasenovac curators have received training in all museological subjects. It
is also important to mention our co-operation with the Auschwitz Birkenau Memorial
Museum, the Imperial War Museum in London, Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, the Anne Frank
House in Amsterdam and the Memorial de la Shoah in Paris.
In 2005 the Republic of Croatia became a regular member of the Task Force for International
Co-operation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research, and through its
international network of institutions and museums, Jasenovac Memorial Site, whose director
is a member of the national delegation to the work group for memorials and museums, has
worked with all members of the International Task Force.
Jasenovac Memorial Site co-operates with the Ministries of Culture and Science, Education
and Sport in the Republic of Croatia in organising international seminars relating to
commemorations of the Day of Holocaust Remembrance on 27 January, and organises many
workshops at Jasenovac Memorial Site, in the Memorial Museum and Education Centre, for
all visitors, as well a for groups of pupils and students from abroad.
President of Croatia Ivo Josipovic and president of Israel
Shimon Peres while visiting Memorial Museum in July 2010
The Flower
Monument in
Jasenovac
Bogdan Bogdanović (Belgrade, 1922 Vienna, 2010), architect, artist and
philosopher designed the Flower
Memorial in Jasenovac. It was built in
1966 on the site of the former Jasenovac
Camp III (Brickworks).
In September 1960 the Central
Committee of the Federation of War
Veterans’ Organisations of Yugoslavia
invited architects to present proposals for
commemorating the Jasenovac
concentration camp.
Bogdanovic’s proposal was accepted: a
Flower Memorial – “a sign of eternal
renewal – an edifice as a superstructure
facing two ways – with a crypt looking
towards the victims, in whom its roots
and crown are planted, and a kind of
inverse cupola – looking towards the light
and the sun. Symbolically, towards life
and freedom…”
LIST OF INDIVIDUAL VICTIMS OF
JASENOVAC CONCENTRATION CAMP
•
The Jasenovac victims are not just numbers. They are men, women and children, with names
and personal histories.
As a means of paying respect to the inmates of Jasenovac and in a desire to preserve their
memory as a warning to future generations, the Jasenovac Memorial Site has compiled a List
of Individual Victims of Jasenovac Concentration Camp and made it available to visitors and
to the public for the first time since the opening of the Memorial Museum in 1968.
We have used hundreds of sources (books, documents, photographs, statements given by
relatives and friends of the Jasenovac victims and field research), of which 169 are
mentioned in abbreviation in the List. We have made critical comparisons of data for each
individual and thus compiled a list of the men, women and children who died in Jasenovac
Concentration Camp.
The list contains biographical details of the victims (name and surname, father’s name, place,
district and date of birth, ethnic affiliation), how the person met his or her death (means of
death, person responsible, year and place of death, camp or execution site where the victim
was killed) and information on the sources which were used in each individual case, as well
as conflicting details from different sources for each victim.
Working in this way, we have collected (until 18 April 2010) a list of dates, names and details
for 80,914 victims. According to the data gathered, 38,236 men, 22,767 women and 19,911
children under the age of 14 were killed in Jasenovac Concentration Camp.
Table of ethnicitys and sexes of the victims
Ethnicity
children
men
women
Total
SERBIAN
12589
20569
12765
45923
ROMA
5599
5644
4802
16045
JEWISH
1513
7701
3551
12765
CROATIAN
139
2823
1235
4197
BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA
MUSLIM
53
875
185
1113
SLOVENIAN
6
193
65
264
CZECH
2
91
17
110
SLOVAK
1
92
13
106
UKRAINIAN
4
50
7
61
MONTENEGRIN
1
25
10
36
HUNGARIAN
1
20
6
27
ITALIAN
17
1
18
RUSSIAN
9
4
13
8
1
10
GERMAN
4
3
7
POLISH
4
2
6
ALBANIAN
1
1
AUSTRIAN
1
1
GEORGIAN
1
1
ROMANIAN
1
1
RUSINI
Unknown
Total
1
2
99
108
209
19911
38236
22767
80914
Jasenovac Memorial Site today
www.jusp-jasenovac.hr