Mother of 12-Year-Old Siniša Seeks Justice for 30 Years
At a commemoration in Mrkonjić Grad, Nevenka Dobrić recounted the harrowing story of the death of her son and father-in-law in a refugee column during Operation Storm.
At a commemoration in Mrkonjić Grad, Nevenka Dobrić recounted the harrowing story of the death of her son and father-in-law in a refugee column during Operation Storm.
On the 31st anniversary of the start of the military-police operation Storm, a commemorative gathering was held in Mrkonjić Grad, where Nevenka Dobrić shared her painful family story. She has been seeking justice for her 12-year-old son Siniša, killed on August 4, 1995, in a refugee column, for three decades.
Nevenka recalled the fateful day when her son Siniša set off on a tractor from their native Crkveni Bok towards Kostajnica, accompanied by his grandfather Petar and her in the trailer. "We hadn't even gone a full 10 kilometers when the Croatian Army cut off the column in the Zelenik forest and killed Siniša and Petar with 12 gunshot wounds," Nevenka Dobrić recounted, as reported by Kurir.rs.
After the shooting, the tractor veered off the road, and the trailer overturned, trapping her underneath. Her parents, who were in the next tractor, pleaded with the soldiers to pull her out. Eventually, they let her, her mother, and her grandmother go, but her father was taken to prison in Ivanja Grad. The brave women of Krajina did not allow the boy's body to remain in the forest, carrying it out to Bosanska Kostajnica.
"For a full 30 years, I have been seeking justice; there is no institution I have not approached to get my child the status of a civilian victim of war," Nevenka said at the gathering, as reported by N1 BiH. She added that she is pursuing lawsuits in courts in the Republic of Croatia but has not yet succeeded in obtaining that status for her son.
"If he is not a civilian victim of war, then are there any Serbian victims in Croatia?" she asked. "As long as I live, I will fight for justice," Nevenka Dobrić stated.
Siniša was buried on August 5, 1995, in Bosanska Kostajnica, and on August 26, 1996, on his birthday, his remains were transferred to Sremska Kamenica, where Nevenka now lives. Her father-in-law Petar is still listed as a missing person.
On her son's memorial, Nevenka herself wrote verses that, as she says, came to her all at once: "Oh, harsh fate, desolate Krajina, what took me young, do you not mourn now? Took me from mother, father, and brother, that I, little one, must be a victim of war. I am not guilty, but I am not alive either."
Operation Storm, which began on August 4, 1995, is celebrated in Croatia as Victory and Homeland Thanksgiving Day on August 5, while in Serbia and the Republika Srpska it is observed as a Day of Remembrance for the killed and expelled Serbs. The Hague Tribunal indicted Croatian generals Ante Gotovina, Ivan Čermak, and Mladen Markač for crimes against civilians. Gotovina was initially sentenced to 24 years and Markač to 18 years in prison, but after more than a year, they were acquitted and released.
The War Crimes Prosecutor's Office of Serbia recently filed an indictment against four senior officers of the Croatian Air Force for ordering the rocket attack on a refugee column on the Petrovačka road and in the town of Svodna on August 7 and 8, 1995. The accused are Vladimir Mikac (67) from Ptuj, Zdenko Radulj (69) from Osijek, Željko Jelenić (69) from Pula, and Danijel Borović (64) from Varaždin.
