tags: | #Croatia, #EU, #human rights violation, #hate crimes, #war crimes |
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located: | Croatia |
by: | Yair Oded |
As a relatively new member of the EU, Croatia still struggles to guarantee protection and equality to minority members of its society, and hate crimes in the country are reportedly increasing to an alarming degree.
Many ascribe this phenomenon to a lack of willingness among many Croatians, including the nation’s leader, to grapple with and acknowledge the country’s painful history of brutal wars, both during WWII and the genocide of 1995.
To this day, public discussion about the wars is tainted by distortion of facts and the glorification of war criminals.
Documenta is a non profit center based in Zagreb that works to accurately document the history of war and human rights violations in Croatia and the region in order to construct an accurate and truthful account of the past, inspire reconciliation, and encourage a national and regional debate about ongoing human rights violations.
“Documenta contributes to the development of individual and social process of dealing with the past, in order to build a sustainable peace in Croatia and the region by deepening the dialogue and initiating a public debate on public policies that encourage dealing with the past, collecting data, publishing research on war events, war crimes and violations of human rights, and monitoring war crimes trials at the local and regional level as a contribution to the improvement of court standards and practices in the war crimes trials,” Documenta writes on its website.
The center works in collaboration with its founding organisations as well as other NGOs and civil rights groups; together they organise programs, workshops and discussions as well asissue various reports and publications covering pre-and post war events and ways of dealing with the past.
Please visit Documenta’s website in order to access their resources, contribute your account to their documentation efforts, or learn about available volunteering or internship opportunities.
Image: Gustavo Medde.
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