Croatia is celebrating a victorious 1995 military offensive in which it retook lands held by rebel Serbs, but which Serbia’s president has compared to the policies of Nazi Germany during World War II.
The starkly conflicting views by the two main Balkan rivals of the August 1995 military blitz that resulted in an exodus of more than 200,000 minority Serbs from Croatia illustrates the persisting divisions in the region stemming from the 1990s’ war.
While Croatia on Sunday hailed the offensive as a flawless military victory that reunited the country’s territory and ended the war, neighboring Serbia mourned the hundreds of victims killed during the attack.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic told a gathering late Saturday that “Hitler wanted a world without Jews; Croatia and its policy wanted a Croatia without Serbs.”