A ceremony was held in the Brezovica Forest Memorial Park near Sisak, about 60 kilometres southeast of Zagreb, on Saturday to commemorate Anti-Fascist Struggle Day.

The ceremony, organised by national, regional and local anti-fascist organisations, started with the playing of the Croatian and European anthems and a minute of silence was observed for those killed in World War II. Before that, wreaths were laid and candles lit at the monument.

“Anti-Fascist Struggle Day should be a holiday for the whole of Croatia and all its citizens, because had it not been for the anti-fascist struggle Croatia would not have existed, and in the (1991-1995) Homeland War defenders would have had nothing to defend,” said Franjo Habulin, the head of the Alliance of Anti-Fascist Fighters and Anti-Fascists of Croatia (SABA), adding that anti-fascism was built into the foundation of modern Croatia and Europe.

He said that “Croatian right-wingers have not yet learned this truth. They persistently ignore and conceal the facts thinking that they will go away, but the facts will not go away.”

Habulin said that the resistance to the occupation had put Croatia and other former republics of Yugoslavia on the victorious side, noting that descendants of the collaborators of the occupying forces brag about their ancestors who were often war criminals.

Habulin expressed concern about “little progress” made in Croatia regarding the perception of anti-fascism, saying that the present government had turned anti-fascism into “an attractive product intended for export.” “Every day we witness the increasingly aggressive propaganda of revisionists who claim that Tito’s Partisans were true villains and that the Yugoslav Federation was a dungeon for the Croatian people.”

He said that there was a tendency to equate fascism and communism as equally evil, warning that historical revisionism was being spread through the press, social media and public television programmes.

Habulin criticised the public broadcaster HRT for trying to rewrite history, citing its latest television serial on communist crimes in Croatia.

Justice Minister Drazen Bosnjakovic, speaking in his capacity and Prime Minister Andrej Plenovic’s envoy, said that Croatia had made a huge contribution to the fight against fascism. “Croatia, as a state, has expressed its position on fascism in its constitution,” he said.

“Today we are a democratic country and today no one will end up in prison just because they have a different opinion,” Bosnjakovic said, adding that “anti-fascism is a bright spot in Croatian history, unlike the NDH (Nazi-allied Independent State of Croatia) which embodied all the evil and injustices done to people.”

“I don’t understand people who don’t understand these facts and who advocate other values,” he added.

“Anti-fascism is in the roots of the Croatian state, it should be nurtured and its spirit instilled in young generations. The one and only truth is that the Croatian state has been preserved and built on the tenets of anti-fascism,” Bosnjakovic said, stressing that historical revisionists would not succeed in their attempts to falsify history.

The mayor of Sisak, Kristina Ikic Banicek, criticised the government for “financing lies and the falsification of the historical truth.”

“When government officials find themselves among their supporters they pamper Ustasha war criminals telling them that they are the Croatian army and that they achieved historical aspirations of the Croatian people. Had it not been for Partisans with a red five-pointed star on their foreheads, the stain on the Croatian people would have been indelible and undeniable,” Ikic Banicek said.

The head of Sisak-Moslavina County, Ivo Zinic, said that at the start of World War II a group of brave men had risen against the greatest evil, fascism, whose ideology threatened human civilisation. “Those brave men stood up against the occupation and crimes,” he said.

This year’s ceremony was held without the presence of top state officials, who sent their envoys. Among those attending were former presidents Ivo Josipovic and Stjepan Mesic and former SDP prime minister and leader Zoran Milanovic, who were all greeted with loud applause. Members of Parliament were also present.

The First Sisak Partisan Detachment was formed on June 22, 1941, as the first anti-Hitler unit in Nazi-occupied Europe and it marked the beginning of the armed struggle for national liberation in Croatia. It was established by Communist Party members in Sisak on the day Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union and initially had 77 fighters.

Croatia has observed Anti-Fascist Struggle Day on June 22 since it gained independence in the early 1990s.