Croatia still searching for 1,725 people missing from Homeland War

Serbia is not cooperating in efforts to resolve the issue of people missing from the Homeland War, despite repeated requests from Croatia, State Secretary at the Ministry of Croatian Veterans Darko Nekić said in Parliament on Friday.

Speaking during a debate on amendments to the Law on Missing Persons in the Homeland War, Nekić said Croatia had sent 25 different types of letters to Serbian institutions but had received almost no responses.

“Despite 25 different types of letters that we have sent to the institutions of the Republic of Serbia, we have not received a response to almost any of them so far. When responses did arrive, they were half-hearted and contained outdated information that we already knew,” Nekić said.

He was responding to HDZ MP Tomislav Zadro, who asked whether there had been any progress in cooperation with Serbia on resolving the issue of missing persons.

SDP MP Ivan Račan asked what the main obstacle to Serbia’s cooperation was. Nekić said the most important information Croatia was seeking concerned the locations of primary and secondary mass graves in formerly occupied areas, which Serbia has information about.

Croatia still seeking key war-time documentation

Croatia has been requesting the return of documentation from Vukovar Hospital and Borovo Commerce, as well as identification protocols, from Serbia since 2016.

“We have not received a single piece of reliable information related to these two groups of cases. We still expect this information to be delivered because the documentation we have confirms that certain protocols exist, and we know where they are,” Nekić said.

He added that Croatia is still searching for 1,725 people whose burial sites have not been identified. Of these, 1,341 are missing, while 384 are known to have died but their burial places remain unknown.

Amendments to help heirs resolve inheritance issues

Nekić said the proposed amendments to the Law on Missing Persons in the Homeland War would allow inheritance proceedings to begin before a missing person is formally declared deceased. The option would be available to all legal heirs, not only family members.

At the request of a family member or another legal heir, the Ministry of Croatian Veterans would issue a decision confirming that a person is missing from the Homeland War or that their burial place is unknown.

“Such a decision will serve exclusively for the purpose of initiating inheritance proceedings before the competent court,” Nekić said.

He stressed that inheritance proceedings would not change the missing person's legal status. Families would therefore be able to settle inheritance matters without first having to seek a formal declaration that their missing relative is deceased.

Representatives who took part in the parliamentary debate expressed support for the amendments.