GRABOVAC: BAN HVO COMMEMORATION IN MODRAN, IT INSULTS SERB PEOPLE

BROD, MARCH 12 /SRNA/ – The president of the Organization for Searching for Fallen Soldiers and Missing Civilians from Brod, Marko Grabovac, said that the LINE institutions of Republika Srpska must urgently ban the gathering of uniformed members of the HVO in Modran on March 21, because it insults the Serb people and the families of the fallen and missing.

Grabovac added that he has nothing against members of the Croat people coming in civilian clothes to the town cemetery to lay wreaths and light candles for their compatriots who were killed in the last war, but that the arrival of former HVO members in uniforms with rifles to a commemoration in Republika Srpska is unacceptable. "In the area of Brod and the entire Posavina region, members of the Croatian Army and the HVO committed horrific crimes against Serbs during the last war, which is why any of their gatherings in the territory of Republika Srpska offends the Serb people and the families of the fallen and missing Serb soldiers," Grabovac told SRNA. According to him, the Veterans' Organization of Republika Srpska must stand in defense of the dignity of Serb soldiers who gave their lives for Republika Srpska and of their families. Grabovac stressed that the authorities in Croatia have never allowed Serbs to cross the Sava River to hold a memorial service for fallen Serbs in Slavonski Brod or to lay wreaths at the places where they were killed. "The authorities in Slavonski Brod have never allowed Serbs to erect a memorial cross at the site where the Serbian Orthodox church under construction once stood, which was demolished and where a parking lot was later built," Grabovac concluded. The Veterans' Organization of Republika Srpska has called on the Interior Ministry and other competent authorities to ban the marking of the 34th anniversary of the formation of the 3rd Battalion Modran of the 103rd HVO Brigade on March 21 in Modran near Derventa and to conduct an investigation into the organization of the event, otherwise they will be forced to prevent the gathering themselves.