Voćin massacre
| Voćin massacre | |
|---|---|
| Part of the Croatian War of Independence | |
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Voćin on the map of Croatia. Territories controlled by Serb or JNA forces in late December 1991 are highlighted in red.
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| Location | Voćin, Croatia |
| Coordinates | 45°37′11″N 17°32′52″E / 45.619861°N 17.547813°ECoordinates: 45°37′11″N 17°32′52″E / 45.619861°N 17.547813°E |
| Date | 13 December 1991 |
| Target | Mostly Croat civilians |
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Attack type
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Summary executions |
| Deaths | 43 |
| Perpetrators | White Eagles paramilitary unit |
The Voćin massacre was the killing of 43 civilians in Voćin, Croatia, by the Serbian White Eagles paramilitary unit on 13 December 1991, during the Croatian War of Independence. The massacre was carried out after the unit was ordered to abandon the village before the Croatian Army (Hrvatska vojska – HV) recaptured the area in Operation Papuk-91. All the victims were local Croats, save one Serb, who had tried to protect his neighbours. Gunfire was the leading cause of death, though some of the victims were killed with axes or chainsaws, or were burned to death. The victims exhibited signs of torture and were left unburied. On the night of 13–14 December, the White Eagles dynamited a 550-year-old church in the village.
The HV secured Voćin on the night of 14/15 December, the Serb population having left the previous night. Afterwards, Croatian soldiers torched many homes belonging to the Serbs who had once inhabited the village. The area was toured shortly afterwards by then-US Congressman Frank McCloskey, who publicised the killings at a news conference held in Zagreb the next day, calling them genocide. He persuaded Dr. Jerry Blaskovich, an Associate Clinical Professor at the University of Southern California Los Angeles County Hospital Medical Center to take part in the investigation of the killings.
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) later charged Slobodan Milošević with the killings and Vojislav Šešelj with the deportation of non-Serbs from Voćin. In 2015, the International Court of Justice ruled that the massacre in Voćin was not an example of genocide, and stated that Croatia had failed to prove that the killings had even occurred.
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