Croatian War of Independence

The International Day of the Disappeared was marked in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Kosovo on Friday with a series of events intended to highlight how thousands of people who disappeared during the 1990s wars have not yet been found.

Gotovina became a national icon when he was indicted in July 2001 by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, ICTY for large-scale crimes against Serb civilians during and after Operation Storm. A broad section of the Croatian public supported his cause, seeing him as a victim of unfair treatment of the young Croatian state by the international community.

On August 5, Croatia marks its Victory and Homeland Thanksgiving Day and the Day of Croatian Defenders with an annual celebration in the southern town of Knin.

"The Serbs have left and it caused tremendous grief and sorrow in the heart of every single Serb. Is Croatia today happier, more successful or wealthier because of it? I have to disappoint you, all of you who glorify and rejoice in the tears of Serbia - the Serbs are not gone. Serbia hadn't vanished", said Vucic from Krusedol.

A Croatian NGO asked the European Court of Human Rights to examine the Zagreb government's refusal to release information about a contract for legal representation for generals Mladen Markac and Ante Gotovina at their Hague Tribunal appeal.

The Croatian Veterans' Affairs Ministry and local authorities in the towns of Daruvar, Petrinja, Sinj and Sibenik signed agreements on Monday to set up new centres for people who fought in the 1991-95 war.

The centres in the four towns will provide care and assistance, basic physical rehabilitation and sporting, recreational and educational activities for Croatian veterans.

A new report by the Humanitarian Law Centre NGO in Belgrade, published on Wednesday, said war crimes proceedings in Serbia are subject to long delays and that justice is being further postponed when retrials are held.

One of the most respected journalists in Serbia, Dejan Anastasijevic, a longtime correspondent for Time magazine, Vreme, Tanjug, B92, the BBC and many others, has died in Belgrade after a long illness.

Born in 1962, Anastasijevic reported from the wars in the former Yugoslavia and wrote extensively about war crimes, earning the wrath of the Serbian authorities at the time.

According to the newspaper, this list was handed over to the War Crimes Prosecution in April of last year and is the last one of this type that was submitted to domestic judicial authorities.

During the meeting Brnabic urged that every effort be made to ensure better treatment of Serbian citizens serving sentences handed down by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).