Croatian Association of Prisoners in Serbian Concentration Camps (Croatian: Hrvatsko društvo logoraša srpskih koncentracijskih logora) is an association of former prisoners in Serbian jails and prison camps during the Croatian War of Independence. The organization was founded in Zagreb in 1995 and began its work that same year. Its offices are located on Ban Jelačić Square.
In 2006 the association was admitted to the World Veterans Federation. Its president as of 2012 is Danijel Rehak.
The organization helps raise monuments, commemorates anniversaries relating to the war and also helps publish related books. In 2004 the association opened a centre in Borovo Naselje whose aim is to research war crimes committed during the war. The centre was opened by deputy prime minister Jadranka Kosor and parliamentary speaker Vladimir Šeks. Jadranka Kosor also served as the minister of Family Affairs, War Veterans and Intergenerational Solidarity, a ministry the association works closely with.
According to the Societies data, a total of 8,000 Croatian civilians and POWs (a large number after the fall of Vukovar) went through Serb prison camps such as Sremska Mitrovica camp, Stajićevo camp, Niš camp and many others where many were heavily abused and tortured. A total of 300 people never returned from them.
A total of 4570 camp inmates have started legal action against former Serbia and Montenegro (now Serbia) for torture and abuse in the camps.
Famous quotes containing the words concentration camps, association and/or prisoners:
“We have our difficulties, true; but we are a wiser and a tougher nation than we were in 1932. Never have there been six years of such far flung internal preparedness in all of history. And this has been done without any dictator’s power to command, without conscription of labor or confiscation of capital, without concentration camps and without a scratch on freedom of speech, freedom of the press or the rest of the Bill of Rights.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
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—Clarence Darrow (1857–1938)
“We are all conceived in close prison; in our mothers’ wombs, we are close prisoners all; when we are born, we are born but to the liberty of the house; prisoners still, though within larger walls; and then all our life is but a going out to the place of execution, to death.”
—John Donne (c. 1572–1631)