US embassy cable - 05ZAGREB590

C O N F I D E N T I A L ZAGREB 000590 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
DEPT FOR EUR/FO - DAS STEPHENS 
EUR/SCE - ENGLISH, GAUDIOSI, KABUMOTO, BENEDICT 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/12/2015 
TAGS: PREL, PGOV, SR, HR, Regional Issues 
SUBJECT: USG REHABILITATING MASS MURDERER? - AMBASSADOR 
GETS BOTH BARRELS OVER MIHAILOVIC MEDAL 
 
Classified By: Ambassador Ralph Frank for reasons 1.5 (b) & (d) 
 
1. (U) This is an action request.  Please see para 4. 
 
2. (C) SUMMARY AND COMMENT: Both President Stjepan Mesic 
and PM Ivo Sanader have called in Ambassador Frank in the 
past 24 hours to express grave concern over press reports 
of a planned U.S. presentation of the Legion of Merit (LoM) 
medal awarded posthumously to Draza Mihailovic, leader of 
the WWII Serbian Chetnik Movement.  Referring in separate 
meetings to the Chetnik Movement's involvement in mass 
killings of non-Serbians and documented collaboration with 
Nazi forces, Mesic and Sanader each warned that presentation 
of the LoM would cause major problems in the region.  The 
USG will redefine history and rehabilitate Mihailovic with 
the LoM, they said, feeding the fires of nationalism in both 
Serbia and Croatia.  Both hoped the USG, which has played a 
key role in establishing and maintaining peace in the region 
for the past 10 years, would recognize the dangers of 
reviving the ghosts of the past. 
 
3. (C) Resurrection of this issue now only threatens 
Sanader's 
efforts to manage the hard right wing of his party and 
undermines the significant efforts of both Mesic and Sanader 
to acknowledge and close the fascist chapter in Croatian 
history. END SUMMARY AND COMMENT. 
 
4. (C) ACTION REQUEST: Post requests that the Department 
seriously revisit the costs and benefits of delivering the 
Mihailovic LoM, weighing carefully the advantages to the 
USG, if any, against definite negative repercussions for 
political stability in the region.  END ACTION REQUEST. 
 
TATTOO TROUBLE: EXTREME SENSITIVITY OVER MIHAILOVIC 
--------------------------------------------- ------ 
 
5. (C) Croatians believe the Serbian occupation of Croatia 
during the 91-95 war was based on Chetnik principles ) 
turning 60-year-old scars into open wounds.  For the GoC, 
veneration of the Chetnik leader cuts close to the bone. 
In November 2004, the Ministry of Interior banned Serbian 
basketball player Milan Gurovic from entering the country, 
describing his upper-arm tattoo of Mihailovic as hate 
speech.  Two Serbian students were later convicted of 
"insulting public morality" after displaying a Mihailovic 
picture on Zagreb's main square in reaction to the ban. 
 
6. (C) Sanader, who has taken significant political risk 
to remove monuments to members of Croatia's own WWII 
fascist regime, clearly fears the likely response to the 
Mihailovic LoM from the right wing, both within and 
outside his party.  Parliament had scheduled a debate 
this week on the Mihailovic medal, threatening to 
escalate rhetoric on the issue, but the PM told the 
Ambassador that he personally intervened and directed 
President of Parliament Vladimir Seks to remove it from 
the agenda and to adjourn until after local elections on 
May 15, by which time he hopes this issue will be closed. 
 
RARE UNITED FRONT FROM PRESIDENT AND PM 
--------------------------------------- 
 
7. (C) Sanader carefully coordinated his demarche with 
Mesic and the two used many of the same talking points, 
a telling sign that these traditional rivals consider 
this an extremely dangerous issue.  Both asked why the 
medal had to be presented now, calling it a bad choice 
to mark the tenth anniversary of the Dayton Agreement 
and a threat to Croatian efforts to end all 
glorification of fascism. 
FRANK 
 
 
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