The central event marking June 22, the Anti-fascist Struggle Day, was organised in the Brezovica forest near Sisak on Friday in memory of the day in 1941 when the 1st Sisak Partisan Detachment was formed, the first anti-Hitler unit in occupied Europe which marked the beginning of an organised national liberation struggle in Croatia in World War II.

As every year, the commemoration was organised by the Croatian Alliance of Antifascist Fighters and Antifascists (SABH), the City of Sisak, and Sisak-Moslavina County. Delegations of state institutions, including those of the president, the Parliament, and the government, laid red carnations at the local monument.

The 1st Sisak Partisan Detachment of 77 fighters was formed by the Communist Party in central Croatian town of Sisak on the day when Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union.

Over 500,000 Croatian citizens took part in the organised national liberation struggle in Croatia. About 230,000 fighters from Croatia were part of the National Liberation Army.

In his address, leader of SABH, Franjo Habulin, said that 77 years ago a group of heroes, anti-fascists, formed a Partisan detachment as the first action of anti-fascist resistance in Croatia at a time when Nazi-fascism was in full swing in Europe.

Although we live in a state founded on the values of anti-fascism, those values are not honoured, and historical revisionism is increasingly strong, he said.

“Although the state has established the Anti-fascist Struggle Day as a national holiday, it amounts to hypocrisy, and a huge lie. Because, despite everything that has been propagated, and the irrefutable historical facts, in independent Croatia, since its early days (in the 1990s), when it was forced to defend itself from modern fascism, it was encouraged to treat fascists from World War II as patriots,” Habulin said, adding that their World War II-era crimes were being downplayed, even negated, sometimes by the highest state officials.

“In present-day Croatia, those in power now have transformed anti-fascism at state level into an attractively packaged product displayed in the window and meant for the world. Day in and day out we are faced with increasingly aggressive propaganda spread by historical revisionists who assure that Tito’s Partisans were the real criminals, that Federal Yugoslavia, in which Croatia kept many essential traits of statehood, was actually a dungeon of the Croatian people,” Habulin added.

The state authorities will prove that they are ready to deal with the truth about the past only by showing that they understand the greatness of the anti-fascist struggle, that they accept anti-fascism as a lasting, indelible, and unchangeable foundation of the present-day independent Croatia, and by honouring those killed in the anti-fascist struggle and the victims of fascism, Habulin said.

“But I’m not talking about respects paid once or twice a year on occasions such as today. I’m talking about respects paid in everyday politics, in daily conduct, by suppressing historical revisionism, building a future on sound foundations of the past, instead of systematically demolishing those foundations, and replacing them with the ruins of a system which had been globally defeated over seven decades ago,” he said.

President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic’s envoy, Medjimurje County prefect Matija Posavec, conveyed her congratulations on Antifascist Struggle Day.

“We have gathered at a place of recent Croatian history, a place which symbolises the history of the anti-fascist struggle in Croatia, a place of uprising against occupation, a place of struggle for freedom, for justice and equality, a place where 77 years ago today young and brave men gathered, determined to resist the occupying enemy and the regime which, joining forces, broke up Croatia and gave parts of its territory to foreign powers,” said Posavec.

He said the formation of the 1st Sisak Partisan Detachment marked the beginning of an organised struggle for freedom and peace, against the most horrible ideology in the history of humankind.

“Anti-fascism and the 1991-95 independence war are in the foundations of the modern Croatian state. Anti-fascism and the independence war do not rule each other out, and every division over historical issues in Croatian society is bad for Croatia’s future,” Posavec said.

The antifascist movement in Croatia was comparatively the biggest in Europe, with about 200,000 resistance fighters and the largest number of victims towards the end of World War II, so we have no right to allow anyone to diminish the greatness of their struggle and sacrifice, or forget them, he said.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic’s envoy, Justice Minister Drazen Bosnjakovic, said Croatia could be proud of having had in World War II one of the most significant resistance movements in occupied Europe.

“To all those who don’t understand and won’t understand history, but want to downplay everything that happened, I wish to say: We can’t change history because it happened, but we must have the right attitude, we must be able to evaluate our history correctly and objectively. And the Republic of Croatia was founded on anti-fascism. That’s the right attitude, and the only way to get rid of the burden of ideological conflicts,” Bosnjakovic said, whose speech was booed.

“This place and this day aren’t for factionalism, or for creating even deeper divisions. This is the only way to dedicate ourselves to the building of a stable and prosperous future for our country, which is in the interest of our children and future generations,” he said, calling for a tolerant social climate.

The commemoration was also attended by representatives of the diplomatic corps, leader of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Davor Bernardic, Zagreb mayor Milan Bandic, former presidents Stjepan Mesic, and Ivo Josipovic, and several MPs.

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