Here is another letter, written by Mr. William Dorich, to The Washington Times, in response to Kuhner’s commentary “Balkan Basket Case”.
Dorich, “for some reason”, Dio, brings up World War Two Croatia as well.
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Letter to the Editor
The Washington Times
Dear Editor:
As a double victim of Genocide, I lost 17 members of my family who were burned to death in a Serbian church in the village of Vojnic, Croatia in 1941 at the hands of Catholic priests and their hateful followers. The late Franjo Tudjman, President of Croatia, had the ruins of that Serbian Orthodox church bulldozed in 1995. In August of that year, during Operation Storm when 200,000 Serbs were ‘ethnically cleansed’ from Croatia, the last 5 relatives of my name were too old and too sick to flee. I was notified a month later they were found with their throats slit.
Jeffery Kuhner is not so outspoken—his underhanded journalism exposes an eagerness to omit half of the story when it does not server his purpose. He never mentions a single word in his Washington Times articles about the successful Genocide of 1.2 million Serbs in Croatia from 1941-45, nor the nearly complete elimination of all Serbs from 1991-95. Such contempt for truth, equal rights and equal justice are further mocked by his style of omission journalism.
Kuhner’s remark: “Hundreds of thousands of Croatians were systematically butchered by Tito’s Partisans; priests, nuns and peasants were massacred; their lands were confiscated; and slave labor camps were established” would be laughable if it were not such an irresponsible lie. It is well documented that less than 60,000 Croats were killed, as the vast majority were Nazi collaborators.
What Kuhner has omitted here is that 740 Roman Catholic priests murdered Serbs and Jews with their own hands in the Holocaust then fled to Argentina to escape justice. Fr. Filipovich, a Catholic priest, ran the Jasenovac Concentration Camp where 700,000 Serbs, 40,000 Jews and 70,000 Roma were put to death. Tudjman had that camp and its adjoining museum bulldozed as well to destroy this evidence.
Mr. Kuhner reveals a selective memory, an outrageous double standard and a total lack of journalistic ethics. At least his family and relatives lived a full life, my were cut short in Croatian Genocide twice in my lifetime.
William Dorich
Los Angeles, CA
February 2009
The writer has written 5 books on Balkan history including “Serbian Genocide 1941-45,” co authored with the late David Martin and Michael Lees and his 1992 book, “Kosovo.”
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The following was posted on “The Washington Times” website in response to the Kuhner article “Balkan Basket Case”. The writer, is appears, is a Croat from Croatia, “Glorija26”
“I just finished translating this for some people back home. Hopefully those who really need to be exposed to another side of reality will get a chance to read it. I would prefer to see more facts and less personal details, but nevertheless, this is something that deserves future attention by Croatian people and criminal justice system (assuming there is such thing in Croatia-I am not quite sure).
I can only speak for myself and I will. I decided to leave Croatia when I was 25 years old. I am 29 now and I do not regret my decision in any way, just the opposite-I am happy that I got out of there in time. Living in Croatia became terribly frustrating for me as my work in the private sector assumed that I needed government’s approval for certain things.
Once I realized that it was impossible to run a legitimate business without notorious blue envelopes (bribery), I realized that living in that system leads to nowhere. Subsequently, I moved to the US where I am enjoying the system that is significantly more transparent and less corrupt that Croatian.
This may not seem like a big deal, but I think that Croatians have gotten used to the status quo. I am still frustrated about the fact that young people have no perspective in the country that is run by corrupt, uneducated people. I have deep love for my homeland, but, at the same time, a lot of frustration due to thieves who are running the country into the ground.
My entire family is in Croatia, including my young brother and cousins who have no perspective. Their education might be free, but the education they get is inadequate and insufficient in comparison with any other western educational system. Teachers, classrooms, and books are outdated, but most of all, there are no jobs for college graduates. And those graduates lack many skills their counterparts in other parts of the world posses after graduating from college.
This is problematic and this is a reflection of the political and social culture in Croatia. Depression and suicide are widely present among young people, cafes are constantly full like somebody pointed out earlier. Busy people have no time to sit in a bar for hours every day. Unfortunately, Croatians have enough time because there is no work and there is no policy in place that is going to help out future generations.
Because of this, I welcome this article and I truly think that the time has come for Croatians to wake up to reality as opposed to living in a fantasy place where Croatia is a perfect utopia where nothing bad ever happens.”
February 10, 2009 at 6:54 p.m.
_http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/feb/08/balkan-basket-case/
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