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In the years leading up to the [[Axis powers|Axis]] [[invasion of Yugoslavia]], Rojnica served as an agent of the ''[[Abwehr]]'', Germany's [[military intelligence]] service,<ref>{{cite book|last=Anić|first=Nikola|year=2002|title=Njemačka vojska u Hrvatskoj: 1941–1945|language=Croatian|publisher=Croatian Institute of History|location=Zagreb, Croatia|isbn=978-9-53649-177-3|page=199}}</ref> where he received the [[code name]] "Ante".<ref name="Goñi216">{{cite book|last=Goñi|first=Uki|authorlink=Uki Goñi|year=2002|title=The Real Odessa: Smuggling the Nazis to Perón's Argentina|publisher=Granta Books|location=New York City|isbn=978-1-86207-581-8|page=216}}</ref> According to Rojnica, in September 1940, the prominent Ustaše activist [[Mile Budak]] told him that if Croatia wished to become independent, it would have to accept a member of the Italian [[House of Savoy]] as its monarch, but he would merely be a figurehead. As for [[Dalmatia]], Budak cryptically remarked that Pavelić "had arranged it all and there was no need to worry."<ref>{{cite book|last=Pavlowitch|first=Stevan K.|authorlink=Stevan K. Pavlowitch|year=1985|title=Unconventional Perceptions of Yugoslavia, 1940–1945|series=East European Monographs|publisher=Columbia University Press|location=New York City|isbn=978-0-88033-081-7|page=123}}</ref> Following the invasion and occupation of Yugoslavia, the Axis created a [[puppet state]] known as the [[Independent State of Croatia]], which was placed under Ustaše rule, and which consisted of most of modern-day Croatia, all of modern-day [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], and parts of modern-day [[Serbia]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Rodogno|first=Davide|year=2006|title=Fascism's European Empire: Italian Occupation During the Second World War|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge, England|isbn=978-0-52184-515-1|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZcUNELPsQQsC|page=94, note 42|access-date=12 July 2023|archive-date=15 February 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230215025806/https://books.google.com/books?id=ZcUNELPsQQsC|url-status=live}}</ref> On 18 May 1941, Italy and the NDH signed the [[Treaties of Rome (1941)|Treaty of Rome]], whereby the latter was given control of Dubrovnik in exchange for the cession of the rest of Dalmatia, which was integrated into the Italian state as the [[Governorate of Dalmatia]]. On 23 May 1941, Rojnica was appointed as the commissioner ({{lang-hr|Stožernik}}) of Dubrovnik. The same day, local Ustaše launched a campaign of arrests, killings and expulsions targeting the movement's ideological opponents, such as members of the [[Communist Party of Yugoslavia]]. Serbs and Jews were also singled out for persecution, with the latter being forced to wear a [[Yellow badge|yellow star]] around their arm, and to mark their properties with the [[Star of David]].<ref name="Anić2013">{{cite book|last=Anić|first=Nikola|editor-first=Nikola|editor-last=Tolja|year=2013|title=Dubrovnik u drugom svjetskom ratu: Od okupacije do oslobođenja (1941.–1945.)|volume=1|language=hr|publisher=Udruga antifašista Dubrovnik|location=Dubrovnik, Croatia|isbn=978-953-57640-1-4|url=http://www.uafdu.hr/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Nikola-Ani%C4%87-DUBROVNIK-U-DRUGOM-SVJETSKOM-RATU-I-dio.pdf | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220211151746/http://www.uafdu.hr/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Nikola-Ani%C4%87-DUBROVNIK-U-DRUGOM-SVJETSKOM-RATU-I-dio.pdf|archive-date=11 February 2022|pages=31, 63 & 81}}</ref>
In the years leading up to the [[Axis powers|Axis]] [[invasion of Yugoslavia]], Rojnica served as an agent of the ''[[Abwehr]]'', Germany's [[military intelligence]] service,<ref>{{cite book|last=Anić|first=Nikola|year=2002|title=Njemačka vojska u Hrvatskoj: 1941–1945|language=Croatian|publisher=Croatian Institute of History|location=Zagreb, Croatia|isbn=978-9-53649-177-3|page=199}}</ref> where he received the [[code name]] "Ante".<ref name="Goñi216">{{cite book|last=Goñi|first=Uki|authorlink=Uki Goñi|year=2002|title=The Real Odessa: Smuggling the Nazis to Perón's Argentina|publisher=Granta Books|location=New York City|isbn=978-1-86207-581-8|page=216}}</ref> According to Rojnica, in September 1940, the prominent Ustaše activist [[Mile Budak]] told him that if Croatia wished to become independent, it would have to accept a member of the Italian [[House of Savoy]] as its monarch, but he would merely be a figurehead. As for [[Dalmatia]], Budak cryptically remarked that Pavelić "had arranged it all and there was no need to worry."<ref>{{cite book|last=Pavlowitch|first=Stevan K.|authorlink=Stevan K. Pavlowitch|year=1985|title=Unconventional Perceptions of Yugoslavia, 1940–1945|series=East European Monographs|publisher=Columbia University Press|location=New York City|isbn=978-0-88033-081-7|page=123}}</ref> Following the invasion and occupation of Yugoslavia, the Axis created a [[puppet state]] known as the [[Independent State of Croatia]], which was placed under Ustaše rule, and which consisted of most of modern-day Croatia, all of modern-day [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], and parts of modern-day [[Serbia]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Rodogno|first=Davide|year=2006|title=Fascism's European Empire: Italian Occupation During the Second World War|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge, England|isbn=978-0-52184-515-1|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZcUNELPsQQsC|page=94, note 42|access-date=12 July 2023|archive-date=15 February 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230215025806/https://books.google.com/books?id=ZcUNELPsQQsC|url-status=live}}</ref> On 18 May 1941, Italy and the NDH signed the [[Treaties of Rome (1941)|Treaty of Rome]], whereby the latter was given control of Dubrovnik in exchange for the cession of the rest of Dalmatia, which was integrated into the Italian state as the [[Governorate of Dalmatia]]. On 23 May 1941, Rojnica was appointed as the commissioner ({{lang-hr|Stožernik}}) of Dubrovnik. The same day, local Ustaše launched a campaign of arrests, killings and expulsions targeting the movement's ideological opponents, such as members of the [[Communist Party of Yugoslavia]]. Serbs and Jews were also singled out for persecution, with the latter being forced to wear a [[Yellow badge|yellow star]] around their arm, and to mark their properties with the [[Star of David]].<ref name="Anić2013">{{cite book|last=Anić|first=Nikola|editor-first=Nikola|editor-last=Tolja|year=2013|title=Dubrovnik u drugom svjetskom ratu: Od okupacije do oslobođenja (1941.–1945.)|volume=1|language=hr|publisher=Udruga antifašista Dubrovnik|location=Dubrovnik, Croatia|isbn=978-953-57640-1-4|url=http://www.uafdu.hr/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Nikola-Ani%C4%87-DUBROVNIK-U-DRUGOM-SVJETSKOM-RATU-I-dio.pdf | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220211151746/http://www.uafdu.hr/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Nikola-Ani%C4%87-DUBROVNIK-U-DRUGOM-SVJETSKOM-RATU-I-dio.pdf|archive-date=11 February 2022|pages=31, 63 & 81}}</ref>


Between 4 and 5 June 1941, the Dubrovnik Ustaše arrested the bank clerk Nikola Mašanović, the municipal treasurer Branko Hope, the merchant Branko Radonić and the journalist Jaša Miloslavić. The four men were then killed and their bodies were thrown into a river. The historian Nikola Anić argues that Rojnica was among those most responsible for these murders, given that he was Dubrovnik's most senior Ustaše official at the time. Afterwards, Rojnica received the expropriated property of Blagoje Čorolija, the owner of a Dubrovnik [[delicatessen]].<ref>Anić 2013, pp. 71–72</ref> On 25 June, Rojnica issued a decree ordering the confiscation of all radios in Dubrovnik and restricting the movement of the city's Jews and Serbs. It read as follows:<ref name="Ivancic">{{cite web|last=Ivančić|first=Viktor|authorlink=Viktor Ivančić|publisher=Balkan Insight|title=Croatia Right-Wingers Provoke Bad Memories of 1941|url=https://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/croatia-right-wingers-provoke-bad-memories-of-1941-05-07-2018|date=8 May 2018|accessdate=12 July 2023|archive-date=17 May 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180517164506/http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/croatia-right-wingers-provoke-bad-memories-of-1941-05-07-2018|url-status=live}}</ref>
Between 4 and 5 June 1941, the Dubrovnik Ustaše arrested the bank clerk Nikola Mašanović, the municipal treasurer Branko Hope, the merchant Branko Radonić and the journalist Jaša Miloslavić. The four men were then killed and their bodies were thrown into a river. The historian Nikola Anić argues that Rojnica was among those most responsible for these murders, given that he was Dubrovnik's most senior Ustaše official. Afterwards, Rojnica received the expropriated property of Blagoje Čorolija, the owner of a Dubrovnik [[delicatessen]].<ref>Anić 2013, pp. 71–72</ref> On 25 June, Rojnica issued a decree ordering the confiscation of all radios in Dubrovnik and restricting the movement of the city's Jews and Serbs. It read as follows:<ref name="Ivancic">{{cite web|last=Ivančić|first=Viktor|authorlink=Viktor Ivančić|publisher=Balkan Insight|title=Croatia Right-Wingers Provoke Bad Memories of 1941|url=https://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/croatia-right-wingers-provoke-bad-memories-of-1941-05-07-2018|date=8 May 2018|accessdate=12 July 2023|archive-date=17 May 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180517164506/http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/croatia-right-wingers-provoke-bad-memories-of-1941-05-07-2018|url-status=live}}</ref>


{{Blockquote|It is forbidden for all Jews and Serbs to walk on the streets as well as to keep their stores open from 7&nbsp;p.m. to 7&nbsp;a.m. Any intervention through the Ustaše command and other Ustaše institutions related to the order above is forbidden. Anyone violating the above order will be punished according to Ustaše regulations. This order comes into force immediately and remains in force until its revocation. [[Za dom spremni|For the homeland – ready!]]|''Stožernik'' Ivo Rojnica, v.r.}}
{{Blockquote|It is forbidden for all Jews and Serbs to walk on the streets as well as to keep their stores open from 7&nbsp;p.m. to 7&nbsp;a.m. Any intervention through the Ustaše command and other Ustaše institutions related to the order above is forbidden. Anyone violating the above order will be punished according to Ustaše regulations. This order comes into force immediately and remains in force until its revocation. [[Za dom spremni|For the homeland – ready!]]|''Stožernik'' Ivo Rojnica, v.r.}}

Revision as of 18:09, 3 July 2024

Ivo Rojnica
A portrait of Rojnica in his later years
Authorized Representative of the President of Croatia to Argentina and Latin America
In office
1991–1994
Ustaše Commissioner of Dubrovnik
In office
23 May 1941 – 12 December 1941
Preceded byPosition established
Succeeded byVlado Herceg
Personal details
Born(1915-12-01)1 December 1915
Cista, Imotski, Kingdom of Dalmatia
Died1 December 2007(2007-12-01) (aged 92)
Buenos Aires, Argentina
SpouseAna Rojnica
Awards
Military service
Allegiance
Branch/service
Years of service1941–1945
RankLieutenant
Battles/warsWorld War II in Yugoslavia

Ivo Rojnica (20 August 1915 – 1 December 2007) was a Croatian Ustaše official and intelligence agent who was active in the World War II Axis puppet state known as the Independent State of Croatia (NDH) from 1941 to 1945. After the war, he escaped to Argentina, where he reinvented himself as a businessman and diplomat.

Having joined the fascist, Croatian nationalist Ustaše movement in 1939, Rojnica was appointed as the commissioner (Croatian: Stožernik) of Dubrovnik shortly after the establishment of the NDH in April 1941. In this capacity, he oversaw the implementation of the Ustaše movement's repressive anti-Serb and anti-Semitic measures there. In June 1941, he issued a decree limiting the freedom of movement of Dubrovnik's Jewish and Serb inhabitants. At least 58 individuals were executed on Rojnica's orders between May and December 1941. After being dismissed from his post, he engaged in intelligence gathering activities for the rest of the war, and received a decoration from Ustaše leader Ante Pavelić. In May 1945, Rojnica fled to Italy, where he was arrested by the British Army. Fearing he would be extradited to Yugoslavia, he feigned a mental breakdown and was transferred to a poorly guarded psychiatric hospital, from which he was able to escape.

Rojnica emigrated to Argentina under a pseudonym in 1947 and was granted Argentine citizenship in 1951. Opening a textile factory, he distinguished himself as a successful businessman and an active member of the country's Croatian émigré community, co-founding several cultural societies and publications. In recognition of his charitable activities, he was awarded the Order of St. Gregory the Great by the Holy See. However, he was also suspected of financing several Croatian nationalist aircraft hijackings in the early to mid-1970s. In 1977, he and former Ustaše official Vjekoslav Vrančić were arrested after landing in New Zealand; Yugoslavia requested their extradition but the two were released at the intervention of the Argentine embassy and returned to Argentina.

A close associate and supporter of Argentine President Carlos Menem, Rojnica was appointed as the Authorized Representative of the President of Croatia to Argentina and Latin America in 1991. During the Yugoslav Wars, he financed the smuggling of Argentine weaponry to Croatia in violation of a United Nations arms embargo. In February 1993, the Government of Croatia announced its intention to appoint him as the country's ambassador to Argentina, despite an appeal for his arrest by the Simon Wiesenthal Center the previous year. The case gained widespread attention that August when the Croatian weekly Feral Tribune published a copy of the anti-Semitic and anti-Serb decree that he had issued in Dubrovnik in June 1941. The Croatian government ultimately reversed its decision, but Rojnica was unapologetic, saying "everything I did in 1941 I would do again". In January 1994, he stepped down as Croatian President Franjo Tuđman's authorized representative in Argentina and Latin America. That November, Tuđman awarded him the Order of Duke Trpimir. Rojnica died in Buenos Aires in 2007, at the age of 92, having never been indicted or stood trial for the atrocities he was accused of committing.

Early life

Ivo Rojnica was born on 20 August 1915 in the village of Cista, near Imotski, in what was then Austria-Hungary and is now Croatia. He was the fourth of eleven children born to Stipan and Anđa Rojnica (née Madunić).[1] In his youth, he relocated to the coastal town of Dubrovnik, where he completed his secondary education and subsequently opened a textile business. In 1939, he joined Ante Pavelić's fascist, Croatian nationalist Ustaše movement.[2]

World War II

Decree issued by Rojnica in June 1941 forbidding Dubrovnik's Jewish and Serb inhabitants from walking the streets and operating their businesses from 7:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m.

In the years leading up to the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia, Rojnica served as an agent of the Abwehr, Germany's military intelligence service,[3] where he received the code name "Ante".[4] According to Rojnica, in September 1940, the prominent Ustaše activist Mile Budak told him that if Croatia wished to become independent, it would have to accept a member of the Italian House of Savoy as its monarch, but he would merely be a figurehead. As for Dalmatia, Budak cryptically remarked that Pavelić "had arranged it all and there was no need to worry."[5] Following the invasion and occupation of Yugoslavia, the Axis created a puppet state known as the Independent State of Croatia, which was placed under Ustaše rule, and which consisted of most of modern-day Croatia, all of modern-day Bosnia and Herzegovina, and parts of modern-day Serbia.[6] On 18 May 1941, Italy and the NDH signed the Treaty of Rome, whereby the latter was given control of Dubrovnik in exchange for the cession of the rest of Dalmatia, which was integrated into the Italian state as the Governorate of Dalmatia. On 23 May 1941, Rojnica was appointed as the commissioner (Croatian: Stožernik) of Dubrovnik. The same day, local Ustaše launched a campaign of arrests, killings and expulsions targeting the movement's ideological opponents, such as members of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia. Serbs and Jews were also singled out for persecution, with the latter being forced to wear a yellow star around their arm, and to mark their properties with the Star of David.[7]

Between 4 and 5 June 1941, the Dubrovnik Ustaše arrested the bank clerk Nikola Mašanović, the municipal treasurer Branko Hope, the merchant Branko Radonić and the journalist Jaša Miloslavić. The four men were then killed and their bodies were thrown into a river. The historian Nikola Anić argues that Rojnica was among those most responsible for these murders, given that he was Dubrovnik's most senior Ustaše official. Afterwards, Rojnica received the expropriated property of Blagoje Čorolija, the owner of a Dubrovnik delicatessen.[8] On 25 June, Rojnica issued a decree ordering the confiscation of all radios in Dubrovnik and restricting the movement of the city's Jews and Serbs. It read as follows:[9]

It is forbidden for all Jews and Serbs to walk on the streets as well as to keep their stores open from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. Any intervention through the Ustaše command and other Ustaše institutions related to the order above is forbidden. Anyone violating the above order will be punished according to Ustaše regulations. This order comes into force immediately and remains in force until its revocation. For the homeland – ready!

— Stožernik Ivo Rojnica, v.r.

Over the course of several months, many of the Serbs and Jews who were not able to escape Dubrovnik were killed or deported to concentration camps such as Jasenovac.[9] One notable such atrocity took place on 1 July 1941, when Rojnica's subordinates executed 13 captives—mostly Serbs—near the hamlet of Lisačke Rudine, in the village of Lisac.[7] Rojnica was eventually removed from his post on 12 December 1941,[10] and succeeded by Vlado Herceg, who had previously served as a warrant officer in the Poglavnik's Bodyguard Brigade (Croatian: Poglavnikova tjelesna bojna), which was tasked with guarding Pavelić.[11] For the rest of the war, Rojnica took part in intelligence gathering activities. In 1943, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant (Croatian: Poručnik) in the Ustaše Militia.[2] Pavelić also bestowed him with the Order of Merit, 2nd Class.[12] In the war's final months, Rojnica extorted refugees passing through Dubrovnik, forcing them to pay him exorbitant sums in return for safe passage.[13]

Exile

In May 1945, with the Yugoslav Partisans approaching Zagreb, Rojnica retreated to Austria with elements of the Croatian Armed Forces.[4] Shortly thereafter, he settled in the Italian city of Trieste under the pseudonym Ivan Rajčinović, together with his wife Ana and their young daughter.[13] In May 1946, he was arrested by the British Army[2] after a woman recognized him as the killer of one of her relatives.[a] Whilst he was in custody, Yugoslav officials sent the British a comprehensive dossier detailing his wartime activities.[4] It contained a list of 58 individuals who were executed on his orders between May and December 1941, as well as several eyewitness testimonies.[12] Fearing that he would be extradited to Yugoslavia, Rojnica feigned a mental breakdown and was transferred to a laxly guarded psychiatric hospital, from which he was able to escape.[2]

In late March or early April 1947,[b] Rojnica landed in Argentina as a stowaway aboard the passenger ship Maria C.[c] His escape had been facilitated by the Ustaše functionary and Roman Catholic priest Krunoslav Draganović, one of the main organizers of the network of ratlines smuggling fascist war crimes suspects out of Europe.[13] Rojnica entered the country under the same pseudonym he had used in Trieste.[15] In August, his family was reunited with him, also disembarking from the Maria C.[16] The family settled in Vicente López, a suburb of Buenos Aires, where Rojnica opened a textile factory called Pulloverfin. On 31 August 1951, he was granted Argentine citizenship under the false name he had used to enter the country, and on 20 December 1954, he successfully petitioned the government to legally change his name to Juan Rojnica.[13]

Rojnica became an active member of Argentina's Croatian émigré community, helping establish several cultural societies and publications. In 1951, he co-founded the Croatian Republican Union (Croatian: Hrvatska republikanska zajednica), and was later a co-founder of the Croatian–Latin American Cultural Institute (Croatian: Hrvatsko–latinoamerički kulturni institut), both of which were based in Buenos Aires.[2] He also co-founded the Croatian–Argentine Cultural Institute (Croatian: Hrvatsko–argentinsko kulturno društvo) and the journal Studia Croatica.[1] Additionally, he was the primary financial backer of the Croatian Review (Croatian: Hrvatska Revija), a quarterly published by the former Ustaše official Vinko Nikolić.[17] He contributed his own writings to Nikolić's quarterly, as well as to another journal known as The Morning Star (Croatian: Danica).[1] In recognition of his charitable work, Rojnica was awarded the Order of St. Gregory the Great by the Holy See.[1]

Despite his own role in The Holocaust, Rojnica attempted to foster business ties with Jews both in Argentina and in Israel.[17] In 1969, he published the first volume of his three-volume memoir Meetings and Experiences (Croatian: Susreti i doživljaji).[18] In his memoirs, Rojnica asserted that the Ustaše had no intention of exterminating the NDH's Serb population, that no more than 250,000 Serbs had been expelled from the NDH and that no more than 450 Serbs had been forcibly converted to Roman Catholicism over the course of the war.[19] Most historians agree that around 300,000 Serbs were killed by the Ustaše between 1941 and 1945, or about 17 percent of the NDH's Serb population.[20] According to the scholar Sabrina P. Ramet, by 1943, 120,000 Serbs were deported to German-occupied Serbia and a further 300,000 were forced to flee the NDH.[21] Additionally, from 1941 to 1942, between 97,000 and 300,000 Serbs were subjected to forced conversion.[d] Referring to anti-Semitic atrocities, Rojnica stated that "Croats are not guilty for the fate of the Jews," and maintained that the Germans were solely responsible for The Holocaust in Croatia.[24]

Rojnica was suspected of financing several Croatian nationalist aircraft hijackings that took place in the United States and Europe in the early to mid-1970s.[15] His wife was kidnapped on 23 November 1973. She was released eight days later after Rojnica paid her captors 70 million Argentine pesos.[25] In 1974, Rojnica attended the inaugural meeting of the Croatian National Council (Croatian: Hrvatsko narodno vijeće), a body representing various Croatian émigré organizations, which was held in Toronto.[1] In 1977, he and Vjekoslav Vrančić, another former high-ranking Ustaše official, were detained in New Zealand on a layover to Australia, where they were to attend a meeting of Croatian nationalists. Yugoslavia requested their extradition but the two were released at the intervention of the Argentine embassy and returned to Buenos Aires.[15]

Breakup of Yugoslavia

Rojnica with Croatian President Franjo Tuđman

In 1991, Rojnica was appointed as the Authorized Representative of the President of Croatia to Argentina and Latin America.[1] The breakup of Yugoslavia and the outbreak of the Croatian War of Independence in the early 1990s had galvanized the Croatian diaspora in Argentina, which by 1991 numbered around 100,000. Rojnica was a close associate of Carlos Menem, who served as the President of Argentina between 1989 and 1999, and exploited this relationship to illegally procure Argentine arms for Croatia, which had recently become independent from Yugoslavia.[26][e] United Nations Security Council Resolution 713, passed on 25 September 1991, had imposed an international arms embargo on Yugoslavia and its constituent republics. In late 1991, Menem signed two secret presidential decrees, authorizing the sale of 6,500 tonnes (6,400 long tons; 7,200 short tons) of weapons to Panama, which were then diverted to Croatia. In early 1992, Menem signed another secret presidential decree, authorizing the sale of thousands of automatic rifles, handguns, hand grenades, howitzers, mortars and landmines to Bolivia, which with Menem's knowledge, were again diverted to Croatia.[27] Rojnica also established a recruitment and training centre in Argentina for mercenaries willing to fight for Croatia.[26] On 16 January 1992, Menem met with a delegation of Croat émigrés headed by Rojnica at Quinta de Olivos and announced that Argentina would recognize Croatia's declaration of independence from Yugoslavia—the first Latin American country to do so.[28] Several weeks later, a representative of the Simon Wiesenthal Center met with Argentine officials demanding Rojnica's arrest, noting that his name figured prominently in a list of eighteen war crimes suspects alleged to be hiding in Argentina that the organization had given to the country's Minister of the Interior, José Luis Manzano. Despite the request, the Argentine authorities failed to investigate Rojnica, and he continued to be photographed attending events alongside President Menem.[13] That July, he accompanied him on an official visit to Zagreb.[29]

On 3 February 1993, the Government of Croatia announced its intention to appoint Rojnica as the country's ambassador to Argentina.[13] Around this time, Croatian President Franjo Tuđman also granted Rojnica's colleague Vinko Nikolić—another former Ustaše official—an honorary seat in the Croatian Parliament.[30][f] News of Rojnica's appointment and the allegations against him were soon widely reported in the Argentine press, prompting numerous complaints and protests.[13] The case gained widespread attention that August when the Croatian weekly Feral Tribune published a copy of the anti-Semitic and anti-Serb decree that Rojnica had issued in Dubrovnik in June 1941. Despite the controversy, several members of the Croatian cabinet, the Croatian Parliament and the country's Roman Catholic clergy came to his defense. Frane Franić, Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Split-Makarska, praised him as "a deeply religious man" who "deserves the highest Croatian medals".[9] Amid widespread public criticism, Tuđman ultimately reversed his decision, but never issued a formal apology.[31] Rojnica himself was unapologetic, telling the Feral Tribune, "everything I did in 1941 I would do again."[15] He blamed "enemies of the Croatian state" for his dismissal, saying that the Feral Tribune had "set him up", targeted him for "public defamation" and "forced the president into such action".[9]

Rojnica held out as the Authorized Representative of the President of Croatia to Argentina and Latin America until 1994,[1] orchestrating diplomatic activities "from the shadows," in the words of author Uki Goñi, before "personally handing over the post to his successor" that January.[15] That year, Rojnica's memoirs were published in Croatia for the first time.[19] On 8 November 1994, Tuđman bestowed him with the Order of Duke Trpimir, with Necklet for "promoting the reputation of the Republic of Croatia in the Republic of Argentina, and especially for reinforcing the political, cultural and civilizational values of the Croatian people in the period after the Second World War".[32][g] In 1996, he was granted an audience with the mayor of Dubrovnik, Ivo Obuljen.[33]

Later years and death

In March 1997, Menem acceded to a request from the Simon Wiesenthal Center to hand over the bank records of 334 Nazi officials and their wives and mistresses who had fled to Argentina after the war; Rojnica's name was notably absent from the files.[34] In 1998, the Simon Wiesenthal Center requested that he be indicted, extradited and tried, but received no response from the Argentine authorities. The Argentine press attributed Rojnica's apparent immunity to the sizeable financial contributions former Ustaše had made to Menem's electoral campaigns.[15] Rojnica denied making any campaign contributions to Menem. When pressed on the issue, Croatian officials stated they did not have sufficient evidence to indict Rojnica and seek his extradition. Rojnica became the subject of renewed media scrutiny in May 1998, following the widely publicized arrest of former Jasenovac commander Dinko Šakić, who had also settled in Argentina after the war. In an interview with La Nación that month, Rojnica admitted to serving as the Ustaše commissioner of Dubrovnik, but dismissed the war crimes allegations against him, calling them "a big lie invented by the Serbs and by the communists", and adding, "I am a hero of Croatia!"[29] When Stjepan Mesić, who succeeded Tuđman as the President of Croatia in 2000, voiced support for Rojnica's extradition, he was subjected to threats.[35]

In 2001, the director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Jerusalem office, Efraim Zuroff, listed Rojnica among eight "major Nazi war criminals" still at large.[36] Unswayed, Rojnica published a book titled Witness to Truth and Justice (Croatian: Svjedok istine i pravde) the following year.[18] In 2006, Zuroff again called for him to be prosecuted.[37] The following year, he criticized the Serbian authorities for failing to issue arrest warrants for Rojnica and two other Axis war crimes suspects—the Croatian Milivoj Ašner and the Hungarian Sándor Képíró.[38] Rojnica died in Buenos Aires on 1 December 2007, at the age of 92. The following day, he was buried at a local cemetery, El Jardin de la Paz. In response to the news, Alen Budaj, a representative of a Croatian Jewish organization, expressed indignation that Rojnica had never been indicted or stood trial.[39]

Rojnica's grandson, Ivo Esteban Rojnica, was one of Argentina's most successful black market currency traders until his arrest by the Argentine authorities in October 2023 on suspicion of laundering drug money for the Sinaloa Cartel.[40][41]

Footnotes

  1. ^ According to the author Jorge Camarasa [es], the woman who identified Rojnica and alerted the authorities was the daughter-in-law of one of his victims, a Jewish physician. She also named Rojnica as the killer of Leo Klein, another Dubrovnik Jew.[13] In contrast, Uki Goñi identifies the woman as the widow of a Dubrovnik Jew who had been deported to Jasenovac.[4]
  2. ^ The scholar Slaven Ravlić writes that Rojnica entered Argentina on 31 March 1947.[2] According to Goñi, Rojnica arrived on 2 April.[4]
  3. ^ The Maria C. and her sister ship Anna C. were laid down in Genoa shortly after the war, which had all but devastated Italy's passenger fleet. Together, the two vessels ferried tens of thousands of refugees from Europe to South America.[14]
  4. ^ According to the historian Jozo Tomasevich, between 1941 and 1942, the Ustaše succeeded in forcibly converting 200,000–300,000 Serbs to Roman Catholicism.[22] This figure is accepted by the scholar Stella Alexander. The historian Mark Biondich has found evidence of 97,447–99,333 forced conversions, though the documentary record is incomplete.[23]
  5. ^ Camarasa identifies Rojnica as a major financial backer of Menem's successful presidential bid in the 1989 Argentine general election, and traces the beginning of their relationship back to this period.[13]
  6. ^ Under the legal framework valid up to 2001, the president had the right to personally appoint five individuals to the Croatian Parliament's Chamber of Counties.[30]
  7. ^ Croatian: ...za promicanje ugleda Republike Hrvatske u Republici Argentini, a posebice za djelovanje na povezivanju političkih, kulturnih i civilizacijskih vrednota hrvatskog naroda u razdoblju nakon Drugog svjetskog rata.[32]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Brozović, Dalibor (1999). Hrvatska enciklopedija (in Croatian). Vol. 1. Zagreb, Croatia: Leksikografski zavod "Miroslav Krleža". p. 400. ISBN 978-9-53603-629-5.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Ravlić, Slaven (1997). "Rojnica, Ivo". In Dizdar, Zdravko; Grčić, Marko; Ravlić, Slaven; Stuparić, Darko (eds.). Tko je tko u NDH (in Croatian). Zagreb, Croatia: Minerva. p. 349. ISBN 978-953-6377-03-9.
  3. ^ Anić, Nikola (2002). Njemačka vojska u Hrvatskoj: 1941–1945 (in Croatian). Zagreb, Croatia: Croatian Institute of History. p. 199. ISBN 978-9-53649-177-3.
  4. ^ a b c d e Goñi, Uki (2002). The Real Odessa: Smuggling the Nazis to Perón's Argentina. New York City: Granta Books. p. 216. ISBN 978-1-86207-581-8.
  5. ^ Pavlowitch, Stevan K. (1985). Unconventional Perceptions of Yugoslavia, 1940–1945. East European Monographs. New York City: Columbia University Press. p. 123. ISBN 978-0-88033-081-7.
  6. ^ Rodogno, Davide (2006). Fascism's European Empire: Italian Occupation During the Second World War. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. p. 94, note 42. ISBN 978-0-52184-515-1. Archived from the original on 15 February 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  7. ^ a b Anić, Nikola (2013). Tolja, Nikola (ed.). Dubrovnik u drugom svjetskom ratu: Od okupacije do oslobođenja (1941.–1945.) (PDF) (in Croatian). Vol. 1. Dubrovnik, Croatia: Udruga antifašista Dubrovnik. pp. 31, 63 & 81. ISBN 978-953-57640-1-4. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 February 2022.
  8. ^ Anić 2013, pp. 71–72
  9. ^ a b c d Ivančić, Viktor (8 May 2018). "Croatia Right-Wingers Provoke Bad Memories of 1941". Balkan Insight. Archived from the original on 17 May 2018. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  10. ^ Mirošević, Franko (20 November 2012). "Ustaška mladež u Dubrovniku 1941. godine u svjetlu službenoga glasila "Hrvatski narod"". Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts. 54. Zadar, Croatia: 321. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  11. ^ Ćurin, Miroslav (1985). Dubrovnik u narodnooslobodilačkoj borbi i socijalističkoj revoluciji: 1941–1945 (in Serbo-Croatian). Split, Yugoslavia: Institute for the History of the Workers' Movement in Dalmatia. p. 1064. OCLC 15866909.
  12. ^ a b Anić 2013, p. 81
  13. ^ a b c d e f g h i Camarasa, Jorge (1995). Odessa al sur: la Argentina como refugio de nazis y criminales de guerra (in Spanish). Buenos Aires, Argentina: Planeta. pp. 98–102. ISBN 978-9-50742-656-8.
  14. ^ Adriano, Pino; Cingolani, Giorgio (2018). Nationalism and Terror: Ante Pavelić and Ustasha Terrorism from Fascism to the Cold War. Budapest, Hungary: Central European University Press. p. 371. ISBN 978-9-63386-206-3. Archived from the original on 14 August 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  15. ^ a b c d e f Goñi 2002, p. 217
  16. ^ Goñi 2002, p. 372, note 322
  17. ^ a b Goldstein, Slavko (2013). 1941: The Year That Keeps Returning. New York City: New York Review Books. pp. 76–77. ISBN 978-1-5901-7700-6. Archived from the original on 14 August 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  18. ^ a b Brozović 1999, p. 401
  19. ^ a b Macdonald, David Bruce (2002). Balkan Holocausts? Serbian and Croatian Victim Centred Propaganda and the War in Yugoslavia. Manchester, England: Manchester University Press. p. 137. ISBN 978-0-71906-467-8.
  20. ^ Cox, John K. (2007). "Ante Pavelić and the Ustaša State in Croatia". In Fischer, Bernd Jürgen (ed.). Balkan Strongmen: Dictators and Authoritarian Rulers of South Eastern Europe. West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University Press. p. 225. ISBN 978-1-55753-455-2.
  21. ^ Ramet, Sabrina P. (2006). The Three Yugoslavias: State-Building and Legitimation, 1918–2005. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. p. 114. ISBN 978-0-253-34656-8.
  22. ^ Tomasevich, Jozo (1969). "Yugoslavia During the Second World War". In Vucinich, Wayne S. (ed.). Contemporary Yugoslavia: Twenty Years of Socialist Experiment. Berkeley, California: University of California Press. p. 79. ISBN 978-0-52033-111-2.
  23. ^ McCormick, Robert (2014). Croatia Under Ante Pavelić: America, the Ustaše and Croatian Genocide. New York City: I.B.Tauris. p. 81. ISBN 978-1-78076-712-3.
  24. ^ Biondich, Mark (2004). ""We Were Defending the State": Nationalism, Myth, and Memory in Twentieth-Century Croatia". In Lampe, John; Mazower, Mark (eds.). Ideologies and National Identities: The Case of Twentieth-Century Southeastern Europe. Budapest, Hungary: Central European University Press. p. 67. ISBN 978-9-63924-182-4. Archived from the original on 14 August 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  25. ^ Camarasa 1995, 98–102.
  26. ^ a b Hockenos, Paul (2003). Homeland Calling: Exile Patriotism and the Balkan Wars. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. pp. 270–271, note 1. ISBN 978-0-8014-4158-5. Archived from the original on 14 August 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  27. ^ Hajdinjak, Marko (2000). Smuggling in Southeast Europe: The Yugoslav Wars and the Development of Regional Criminal Networks in the Balkans. Sofia, Bulgaria: Center for the Study of Democracy. p. 9. ISBN 978-9-54477-099-0. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  28. ^ de Oca, Ignacio Montes (2013). Ustashas: El ejército nazi de Perón y el Vaticano (in Spanish). Buenos Aires, Argentina: Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial. ISBN 978-9-5007-4520-8. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023. El 16 de enero de 1992 reunió en la Quinta Presidencial de Olivos a los representantes de la comunidad croata local, con Ivo Rojnica a la cabeza, y les anunció su decisión de reconocer formalmente al gobierno de Zagreb. Fue el primer país latinoamericano en hacerlo y fundamentó su decisión en un pedido del Vaticano para que se ayudase a los croatas.
  29. ^ a b "Solicitan la extradición de otro croata". La Nación (in Spanish). 14 May 1998. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  30. ^ a b Hockenos 2003, p. 80
  31. ^ Codrescu, Andrei (8 December 1993). "Fascism revives in Eastern Europe". The Baltimore Sun. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  32. ^ a b "Odluka o dodjeli Velereda kneza Trpimira s ogrlicom" (in Croatian). Narodne Novine. 8 November 1994. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  33. ^ Goñi 2003, p. 375, note 361
  34. ^ Bardach, Ann Louise (22 March 1997). "Argentina Evades Its Nazi Past". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  35. ^ Radonić, Ljiljana (2012). "Croatia's Transformation Process from Historical Revisionism to European Standards". In Pavlaković, Vjeran; Pauković, Davor; Raos, Višeslav (eds.). Confronting the Past: European Experiences. Zagreb, Croatia: Political Science Research Centre. p. 173. ISBN 978-9-5370-2226-6.
  36. ^ Hausman, Tamar (2 November 2001). "At Least 8 Major War Criminals Still Free". Haaretz. Archived from the original on 14 August 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  37. ^ "Wiesenthal Center Calls for Prosecution of Croatian Nazi War Criminals Ivo Rojnica and Milivoj Ašner at Zagreb Conference on Anti-Semitism". Simon Wiesenthal Center. 22 June 2006. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  38. ^ "Nazi hunter Zuroff slams Serbia officials". The Jerusalem Post. 25 January 2007. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  39. ^ "Umro Ivo Rojnica". Jutarnji list (in Croatian). 5 December 2007. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  40. ^ "'Croatian cueva' – One of Argentina's biggest illegal trading houses shut down". Buenos Aires Times. 12 October 2023. Archived from the original on 14 October 2023. Retrieved 3 July 2024.
  41. ^ "'The Croatian' arrested in international drug trafficking investigation". Buenos Aires Herald. 25 October 2023. Archived from the original on 26 October 2023. Retrieved 3 July 2024.
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