Free Republic

OTTAWA — At the request of the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada, Her Excellency the Right Honourable Michaëlle Jean, Governor General of Canada, will make an official visit to the Republic of Slovenia, from October 21 to 22, a State visit to the Republic of Croatia, from October 23 to 27, and a State visit to the Hellenic Republic, from October 29 to 31, 2009, during which she will be accompanied by her husband His Excellency Jean-Daniel Lafond. “Slovenia and Croatia are young democracies whose roots reach back through centuries of history. Canada is young, but it...

Croatian extreme right-wing NGO The Croatian Cultural Movement (HUP) has announced plans to erect a monument in honor of former Croatian president Ante Pavelic in Zagreb, Croatia, this December. Ante Pavelić visiting Hitler at Berghof. SLIDESHOW: Israel & Region | World HUP president Tomislav Dragun has been quoted as saying that the monument will stand adjacent to the capital's central square. Pavelic, the president of Croatia during World War II, was known for his state-organized terror campaign against Jews, Serbs, Gypsies and anti-fascist Croats. He was installed as the president of the Independent State of Croatia (NDH) in 1941, a...

Sick Heil!By BRIAN FLYNN Published: 08 Sep 2009 CROATIAN football chiefs are using a sick fascist hatemonger to whip up a vile racist frenzy among fans. A Sun investigation today reveals the Croatian FA is behind a cynical campaign encouraging thugs - who will be at Wembley for tomorrow's match against England - to worship the right-wing nut spreading hatred and Sieg Heil chants on the terraces. Shocking songs by fascist rocker Marko Perkovic that glorify genocide and Hitler's death camps are played at Croatia's home matches. And his sick slogans are chanted by thousands of fans. England striker Emile...

Priest, investigated by Vatican, chose to leave order and priesthood By JOHN P. CONNOLLY, The Bulletin Monday, July 27, 2009 Pope Benedict XVI has defrocked a priest at the center of alleged apparitions at the Bosnian town of Medjugorje, according to a report by the Catholic News Agency. Fr. Tomislav Vladic reportedly decided to leave the priesthood and his religious order during an ongoing investigation of his role in the claims of apparitions, including an accusation of sexual misconduct for getting a nun pregnant. Fr. Vladic was at odds with the Vatican and the local bishop of Medjugorje when he...

German Eurofighter transports sweet mustard to Croatia Croatian Times Sausage-noshing German ambassadors used a 67 million GBP Eurofighter warplane to fly emergency supplies of mustard to a VIP party. Diplomats in Croatia wanted to serve traditional white bangers at the bash to celebrate Germany's 60 years as a democracy but couldn't get the right mustard anywhere locally. So they called in air support from the Luftwaffe who sent pilot Norbert Biehler with a case of the special sweet mustard for the party, reports Croatian newspaper Jutarnji List. Now the extravagant use of military funds in under investigation in Germany. "It's...

'All for me, nothing for you' message a hit with voters A Croatian politician is close to becoming the mayor of the town Prolozac - despite promising to be corrupt and to treat the town "like our family business". Voters have flocked to the campaign, which runs under the slogan "All for me, nothing for you". Josko Risa polled 27.89 per cent of the vote in the first round of voting on Sunday, placing him second. Croatian newspaper Slobodna Dalmacija reports that he will now face Mate Lasic, the current incumbent from the Croatian Democratic Union, in a run-off on...

A far-right Croat MP has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for war crimes against Serb civilians during Croatia's war of independence in the early 1990s. A court in Zagreb found Branimir Glavas had given orders to a paramilitary unit under his command to murder six Serbs in the eastern city of Osijek in 1991. The former general was charged last year after the Croatian parliament partially lifted his legal immunity. Glavas denies any wrongdoing and says his trial was politically motivated. He blames the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), from which he was expelled in 2006 after clashing...

Britain's Foreign Office is warning visitors to Croatia this summer to beware of a threat from organised crime, following a number of assassinations and attacks on prominent figures, reports Matt Prodger.Irena Scuric shows Matt Prodger the scene where Ivo Pukanic was killed "We heard a very loud and low noise, something like voooom!" On the evening of 23 October 2008, Irena Scuric was eating pizza with her daughter in a restaurant less than a minute's walk from the offices of one of Croatia's most popular newspapers, Nacional, when they heard a blast. "We saw the car, which was burnt," she...

New Allegations by Holocaust Survivors against Franciscan Order - OFMDetails Slowly Emerge about Nazi Gold in Vatican April 16, 2009 San Francisco United States District Court for Northern California Alperin v. Vatican Bank and Franciscan order Case No. C-99-4491 MMC A federal court judge has overruled objections of the defendant Franciscan Order of Friars Minor (OFM) and has permitted the filing of an Amended Complaint in the decade long lawsuit Alperin v. Vatican Bank & Franciscan Order. The plaintiffs, Holocaust survivors and their heirs from former Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, are seeking an accounting and return of gold and...

On April 10th, the day the Independent State of Croatia was born in 1941 to begin a state-mandated campaign of genocide against Serbs, Jews, and Romas, a U.S. judge, for the first time in Western history, issued (on behalf of Barry Lituchy) a permanent ban against a book containing testimonies of Holocaust/genocide survivors.Below: I. Brief History of the Lawsuit A. Initial demands of Lituchy, et al. B. Demands in the Complaint C. Claims in the Complaint D. The lawsuit against Kingsborough E. Preliminary Injunction F. Settlement demands G. Lituchy’s attacks II. Current Status A. Appeal to the Second Circuit III....

WASHINGTON, April 9, 2009 – For NATO’s two newest members, a National Guard program contributed to their April 1 accession into the alliance. Albania and Croatia have been members of the National Guard’s State Partnership Program for more than a decade. Along with other initiatives such as NATO’s Partnership for Peace program, the National Guard’s State Partnership Program helped the countries prepare for NATO membership, National Guard Bureau officials said. Established in 1949 as a defense pact against the former Soviet Union and now 28 members strong, NATO celebrated its 60th anniversary April 4. A dozen countries founded NATO...

A mass grave dating from World War II and containing the remains of up to 4,500 people, including German officers and their Croatian allies, has been found near Zagreb, media reports said Saturday. Bones were found in six caves at Harmica, in the Zapresic region, some 20 kilometres (12 miles) west of the capital, close to the border with Slovenia, newspapers and state television said. The website of the daily Jutarnji List said they included soldiers of the Croation Ustachi regime allied to the Nazis and some 500 German army officers. It quoted an official of the Croatian branch of...

Croatia will not use its membership in NATO to solve outstanding issues with neighbouring countries. On the contrary, Croatia’s goal is security and development of all countries in the region, Croatian President Stjepan Mesic said at the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation session in Strasbourg on Saturday. President Mesic said that Croatia joined this military-political alliance to boost its security, but also to contribute to the stability and security of other countries, especially South-Eastern European countries. He believes that what is important for Croatia is not merely joining NATO, but also the whole process of accession during which Croatia met a...

Croatian President Mesic and Prime Minister Ivo Sanader ZAGREB, CROATIA - "This is a historic moment because Croatia is arriving at the summit as a member of NATO. We waited very long for this moment and we implemented all the necessary reforms. We got an army which is depoliticised and profesionalised," Croatia’s President Stjepan Mesic said before leaving for the NATO Summit in Strasbourg. He voiced satisfaction with the fact that he would be present at that historic moment. "NATO is not an army, it is also a political alliance which gathers countries that protect certain democratic values, freedom, democracy,...

Stjepan Mesic, Barack Obama, Ivo Sanader Albania and Croatia have already done a lot on behalf of NATO, Barack Obama said, alluding to soldiers participating in peace missions. The NATO summit in Strasbourg began with a minute of silence for people who had been killed on behalf of NATO. After that, French President Nicolas Sarkozy held a speech. He said the summit was taking place in Germany and France to show that these two countries ensure peace and security together. German Chancellor Angela Merkel stressed that Afghanistan is NATO’s biggest challenge. "We must define our goals and periodically determine what...

PRIŠTINA -- Croatian President Stjepan Mesic; said Croatia and Kosovo have well-developed bilateral cooperation at all levels and this cooperation should be strengthened. In an interview with Radio Television Kosovo (RTK), he said that Kosovo was well organized, that all state institutions had been formed and were functioning, and that it was becoming a more functional state. “The proof is in the fact that more than 50 countries in the world have recognized Kosovo,” Mesic said. He said that the development of industry was of special importance, to encourage foreign investors to come to Kosovo and to take advantage of...

ZAGREB, Croatia-A prosecutor in Croatia has lifted the veil on a painful episode of Balkan history: the execution of thousands pro-Nazi soldiers and civilians at the end of World War II. The Croatian state attorney has asked that a case be brought against an elderly former major in the communist-run Yugoslav army on suspicion of ordering 13,000 people put to death. It marks the first legal procedure ever in Croatia regarding postwar killings carried by the victorious antifascists, or partisans. And part of the evidence may be the accused's own autobiography. Simo Dubajic, 86, is suspected of ordering the executions,...

Planters mark the border between Obrezje, Slovenia, foreground, and Bregana, Croatia — and between a NATO and European Union member and a nonmember. OBREZJE, Slovenia — Customers at Kalin, a rustic, 180-year-old tavern, can eat roast pork dinners here in Slovenia, step a few yards across the room to Croatia to use the bathroom, saunter back to Slovenia to pay the bill and end their meal on Croatian soil over a game of billiards and a shot of local pear brandy. They can do so because of the vagaries of history and an accident of geography. To prevent any confusion,...

ICTY - Tribunal Update Zagreb awarded damages to families of victims killed in detention. Croatia secretly paid 1.8 million kuna (250,000 euro) to the families of people killed in the notorious Lora prison camp in the early 1990s, confirmed officials this week. Lora, a Yugoslav-era naval base in the coastal city of Split, was taken over by Croatian forces in 1991, the start of the Croatian war of independence, as the Serb-dominated Yugoslav army, JNA, forces withdrew. From 1992 to 1997, it functioned as a prison camp for mainly Serbian, but also Bosnian and Montenegrin, civilians and prisoners of war,...

VINKOVCI, Croatia (AFP) – Croatians on Saturday cooked up what they claim to be the world's largest sausage, measuring 530 metres (1,738 feet). Hundreds of locals gathered in the main square of Vinkovci in the country's east and grilled the giant sausage, made with 400 kilogrammes of pork, 10 kilos of salt, 2.5 kilos of spices and 3.5 kilos of garlic bought for a local farm, the town hall said.