Croatia’s President decorates retired generals

Pixsell/Miranda Cikotic, Mladen Markac

President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic decorated retired Croatian Lieutenant Generals Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markac, on the occasion of Victory and Homeland Thanksgiving Day and the Day of Croatian Veterans on Friday, her office said in a statement.

Besides, 96 members of the armed forces were promoted to a higher rank, and 14 were decorated.

The August 5 is differently marked in Croatia and Serbia.

Zagreb celebrates its 1995 victory over rebel Serbs who held some 25 percent of Croatian territory for four years, while Belgrade is mourning the dead and refugees who fled the former Yugoslav republic in fear of its army and police.

Gotovina and Markac were accused of war crimes during and after the August 1995 Croatian operation ‘Storm’ before the International War Crimes Tribunal in the Hague (ICTY).

The two were sentenced to long-time imprisonment in the first instance but were cleared of all charges by the ICTY’s Appeal chamber.

Belgrade considers that to be an international injustice.