Representatives of the Serb, Jewish, and Roma ethnic minorities and World War II anti-fascist fighters on Thursday called on Croatian state institutions to condemn and prevent what they called "the spreading of hate" against ethnic groups who had been victimised by fascism in the past.

They also called on institutions to prevent the disseminating of false claims about the criminal nature of the World War II Nazi-allied Independent State of Croatia (NDH) which was based on racial laws.

“The way Germany and Austria are dealing with these phenomena should serve as an example of how Croatia should treat them too,” a letter sent to the media and jointly signed by ethnic Serb MP Milorad Pupovac, ethnic Roma MP Veljko Kajtazi, Jewish community leader Ognjen Kraus, and the leader of the largest anti-fascist association SABA, Franjo Habulin, said on Thursday.

The letter came days after Austria’s government moved to ban public displays of symbols related to NDH and the World War II Croatian fascist Ustasha regime, after they have been used by far-right groups and individuals at the annual memorial ceremony near Austria’s border town of Bleiburg.

The statement, in which they warn about the alarming spread of historical revisionism and denialism in Croatia, was also sent to President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic, Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, Parliament Speaker Gordan Jandrokovic, as well as the Chief State Prosecutor Drazen Jelenic.

Their statement said that Serbs, Jews, Roma, anti-fascists and all Croats who stood up against the Ustasha regime which ruled NDH are deeply concerned about “the increasing number of cases which insult the memory of their compatriots, fellow fighters, and all opponents of the NDH – who were victims of the Holocaust, genocide, and war crimes.”

“The number of victims gets downplayed, we hear denials that those crimes were committed in the NDH, and that NDH was based on racial laws. The President, the government, the Parliament, the chief state prosecutor, courts, and police do not only fail to condemn such incidents, but their representatives sometimes even take part in them,” the statement said.

It went on to say that “the revisionist movement has been gaining ground with the help of the Catholic Church, some local government units, and some war veterans’ associations,” noting that the national media, primarily the public broadcaster HRT, are legitimising the movement by promoting it in its news programming, as well as its education and entertainment shows.

The statement included an observation that in recent years Croatian society has been faced with a tide of historical revisionism and forgeries of historical facts about the World War II fascist NDH, and that such phenomena have been steadily on the rise since 2012, when hardliner Tomislav Karamarko took the helm of the conservative Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) party.

“This culminated in the first half of 2016, during the short-lived cabinet of Tihomir Oreskovic, when ultra-conservative groups launched an offensive against many state institutions. Influential segments of the Catholic Church in Croatia have turned it into an institution most strongly involved in the promoting the deniers of crimes of the Ustasha regime, and the victimisation of Ustasha soldiers killed in World War II,” said the letter signed by the leaders of ethnic minorities and anti-fascists.

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