Željko Ražnatović

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Željko Ražnatović
17 April 1952 – 15 January 2000 (Age: 47)
Place of birth Brežice; Slovenia, FPR Yugoslavia
Place of death Belgrade; Serbia, FR Yugoslavia
Allegiance Serbia
Years of service 1991 – 1995; Croatia and Bosnia (operative leader of volunteer troops) 1998 – 1999 Kosovo (only as figure of front's supervisor)
Rank Leader of the Serb Volunteer Guard
(Unofficial paramilitary force)
Unit Serb Volunteer Guard

Željko Ražnatović (Serbian: Жељко Ражнатовић), widely known as Arkan (Serbian: Аркан), (April 17, 1952 - January 15, 2000), was a Serbian paramilitary leader accused on numerous accounts of war crimes committed during Yugoslav Wars in the 1990s.

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[edit] Early life and criminal career

Arkan was born in Brežice, a small town in the Styrian region of southern Slovenia where his father was stationed at the time, but also spent a part of his childhood in Zagreb and Pančevo before his dad's job eventually took the family to Belgrade, which Arkan considers his hometown. His disciplinarian father Veljko Ražnatović was a Montenegrin Serb who served as a decorated officer in the SFR Yugoslav Air Force, earning high rank for his notable World War II involvement on the Partisan side, while Arkan's mother Slavka Josifović also took part in the war as a communist activist.

Arkan grew up with three older sisters in a strict, militaristic household with beatings administered by his father being a regular occurrence. In a 1991 interview for Duga magazine, Arkan recalled: "He didn't really hit me in a classical sense, he'd basically grab me and slam me against the floor".[1] His parents eventually divorced during his teenage years.

It wasn't long before Arkan started rebelling and acting out. He was only nine when he ran away from home for the first time, spending a month and a half in Dubrovnik's international camp. He also often ran away to stay with his more welcoming relatives, and simultaneously also got involved in various kinds of mischief, eventually ending up in a delinquents' institution. He became a petty criminal (purse snatching, kiosk break-ins, etc.) in his early teenage years, before graduating to more serious offenses as an adult.

In 1972, at the age of 20, he illegally emigrated to Western Europe, hoping to find fortune through a criminal career. Abroad, he met many well-known criminals from Yugoslavia who were later killed. He took his nickname, "Arkan", after one of the false names of his multiple passports. As an armed robber, assailant and murderer he had convictions or warrants in Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy.

He was imprisoned in Belgium in 1974, escaped in 1977, rearrested in the Netherlands in 1979 but escaped again in 1981. At one point, he was wounded in a clash with police. He fled from dozens of European prisons, including the compound which is today a high security prison for war criminals in the Scheveningen suburb of the Hague. Ražnatović was even on Interpol's ten most wanted list.

In his youth, Arkan was a ward of the Slovenian politician Stane Dolanc, his father's friend. Dolanc was chief of the secret police and a close associate of the Yugoslav strongman Josip Broz Tito. Whenever Arkan was in trouble Dolanc helped him as a reward for his services to the Yugoslav secret state police (UDBA). Arkan worked as an undercover agent from 1973, whose job was to carry out assassinations of political emigrants and opponents of the ruling regime.

Arkan learned the main European languages because of his undercover works in Europe. He spoke fluent English, French and Italian, and was also familiar with German, Swedish and Dutch. He also spoke some Albanian and Bulgarian.

He returned to Yugoslavia in 1981 and continued his criminal career, opening a number of illegal businesses. In November 1983, two federal policemen ambushed Arkan at his house in order to have him arrested and interrogated over some of his activities. He resisted, pulled out his gun, and shot and wounded both of them. An intervention from Stane Dolanc effected his release from prison only two days later. This incident increased Arkan's criminal-political reputation in Belgrade.

[edit] Role in the Yugoslav wars

As the political, ethnic and religious situation in the former Yugoslavia in the early nineties became tense, on October 11, 1990 Arkan created a paramilitary group named the Serb Volunteer Guard under the auspices of the Yugoslav Peoples Army (JNA) general staff. Arkan was the leader of this newly founded unit, which was primarily made up of the football hooligans of his favorite club at the time, Red Star Belgrade. [1]

In November of 1990, Arkan traveled to Knin for a meeting of the council of war of the "Republic of Serbian Krajina". On the way back to Belgrade, he was arrested for gun-running by Croatian police at the border crossing between Croatia and Bosnia Dvor na Uni with five other Serbians on November 29, 1990. His group was charged with conspiracy to overthrow the newly formed Croatian state and the attempted assassination of the then newly elected Croatian president Franjo Tuđman. He was released from prison on June 14, 1991 under unclear circumstances, after a sensational political trial in Zagreb, the Croatian capital.

Arkan's Tigers, a paramilitary force he created, set up their headquarters and training camp in a former military facility in Erdut. His volunteer army saw action from mid 1991 to late 1995, initially in Vukovar region of Croatia. It is reported that his irregular military unit consisted of up to 10,000 well-trained fighters equipped with modern weapons, including a few tanks and helicopters. His units were supplied and equipped by the reserves of the Serbian police force during the war in Croatia and Bosnia.

After war broke out in the former Yugoslav republic of Croatia in the fall of 1991 and in Bosnia in April 1992, Arkan and his units Bijeljina moved to attack different territories in these countries. In the Krajina Arkan's Tigers fought in various locales in Eastern Slavonia. In the Republika Srpska, Arkan's Tigers, fought in battles in and around Zvornik and Brčko where they along with other Serb units overpowered the poorly armed and trained Bosniaks.

In autumn 1995 his troops fought in the area of Banja Luka, Sanski Most and Prijedor where they were routed. Arkan personally led most of war actions, and rewarded his most efficient officers and soldiers with ranks, medals and eventually the products of the lootings.

Arkan came to serve as a popular icon for both Serbs and their enemies. For Serbs he was a folk hero and patriot, while serving as a target of hatred and envy to their enemies. His troops were also stationed in the Republic of Serbian Krajina to fight against the Croatian army, and he had a dispute over military operations with the Serbian regional leader Milan Martić [2]. Arkan was a confidant of Zoran Đinđić and occasionally met with him during the war. During the NATO bombing campaign, Arkan warned Đinđić to leave the country because his life was in danger. Arkan also had friendly contacts and political plans with Russian ultra-nationalist politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky (Zhirinovsky is also friend of Serb ultranationalist politician Vojislav Seselj).

[edit] Power and influence in Yugoslavia

“ If NATO troops will come with ground forces, I will be the first volunteer in the Yugoslav army to defend my country, my family, my children. ”

—Željko Ražnatović, 1999

[2]

Arkan was a powerful man with high-level connections in the state apparatus. He had significant influence over public spheres of Serbian society. For his public image, Arkan presented himself as a defender of Serbs and fighter for freedom and justice. He was known for his multiple personalities, being a strong, often brutal leader in public and more caring and reserved in private. Arkan also organized and financed humanitarian aid for poor families and war orphans. He gave pensions to his crippled volunteers and the families of slain soldiers.

Arkan was glorified by part of the Serb population as a war hero, and was the subject of war songs. Others despised him because of his playboy lifestyle and enormous wealth gained through shady means. He owned a voluminous mansion in the elite Belgrade neighborhood of Dedinje where high-ranking politicians and foreign diplomats reside. Despite being raised an atheist in a family of communists, Arkan made a point of showing public respects to the Serbian Orthodox Church, especially its head Patriarch Pavle. Additionally, he observed and celebrated various religious holidays, often publicly. Some questioned the motives behind these public displays of his newfound religious spirituality and saw it as shameless self-promotion ploy in an attempt at ingratiation with the Serbian public.

On November 3, 1993, Arkan and his followers founded the Party of Serbian Unity, and he became its president, but the party lost parliamentary elections and failed to win seats despite an energetic promotional campaign. In the 2000 election, however, the party received 200,000 votes and won 14 seats in the Serbian parliament.

In the postwar period after the Dayton agreement was signed, Arkan returned to his interests in sport and private business. The Serb Volunteer Guard was officially disbanded in April 1996 with the threat to be reactivated in case of war emergency. In June of that year he took over a second division soccer team Obilić which he soon turned into a top calibre club, even winning the league championship one season. According to a book by Franklin Foer, "How Football Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization", Arkan threatened players on opposing teams if they scored against Obilić.

This threat was underlined by the thousands of veterans from his army that filled their home ground, chanting threats, and on occasion pointing pistols at opposition players during matches. One player told the British football magazine Four-Four-Two that he was locked in a garage when his team played Obilić. The Union of European Football Associations prohibited Obilić from participation in Europe because of its connections. As a result, Arkan stepped away from the position of president and gave his seat to his wife Ceca. Arkan was also a chairman of the Yugoslav Kickboxing Association.

Arkan has been accused of being involved in protection rackets, money extortion, and the smuggling of oil and luxury items. Later he pursued more legitimate business and had about 400 people working for him. He owned casinos, discos, gas stations, pastry shops, stores, bakeries, restaurants, gyms, as well as a private security agency.

Arkan fathered nine children by five different women and was a great womanizer. His eldest son Mihajlo was born in 1975 from a relationship with a Swedish woman, Agneta. Mihajlo went to war with his father. Then followed two daughters, one from relations with a Belgian woman and other with a Belgrade actress, all three with his acknowledged paternity. Arkan's first wife was Natalija Martinović, professor of Spanish, with whom he had four children. Arkan later divorced her and married (using a Serb military World War I uniform) the much younger Svetlana "Ceca" Veličković, a popular and attractive turbofolk singer, on February 19, 1995. They functioned as a prestigious and glamorous couple often appearing in public. Their children are son Veljko and daughter Anastasija.

Arkan was unofficially allied with Slobodan Milošević, and moved under his control, although he was completely independent in his actions and decisions. Contacts between the men were usually carried out through the offices of a mediator Radovan Stojičić "Badža", Serbia's police chief and Milošević's close associate, who was killed in April 1997.

In August 1998, when tensions over Kosovo had already began, Arkan tried to get close to the West, writing a letter of support to U.S. president Bill Clinton over the bombings of U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. In the letter he expressed condolences for the victims that died in the attack, and warned Clinton on the dangers of Islamic fundamentalism. An excerpt from his letter reads: "Mr President… do not allow that terrorism continues in this part of Balkan in the Serbian state, which is forever a friend of your state." Clinton ignored him and never responded to the letter.

[edit] Role in the Kosovo war

“ They have been waiting for eight years to tell me that I am a war criminal and now they do it ”

—Željko Ražnatović, 1999

[3]

When war broke out in Kosovo in the summer of 1998, Arkan is alleged to have ordered his officers and soldiers to join the army and police in the fight against the Kosovo Liberation Army, but he personally did not go there to supervise the front situation. Before the worst of the unrest began, Arkan visited Kosovo on several occasions as a government official, trying to pacify Albanians and to give a sense of security and hope to local Serbs. Nevertheless, Arkan is accused of playing a military role during Operation Allied Force.

According to chief judge Richard May from the United Kingdom, the ICTY issued an indictment against Arkan on September 30, 1997 for war crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and grave breaches of the Geneva convention of 1949 for customs and traditions of war. The warrant was kept sealed and was not made public until March 31, 1999, when the NATO bombing in Yugoslavia had already started week earlier. Arkan's indictment was made public by Louise Arbour, then U.N. court's chief prosecutor, who moved to take a position as a justice of the Supreme Court of Canada only months later.

During the period of the NATO aerial bombardment of Serbia, Arkan decisively denied all war crime charges against him in interviews he gave to CNN, BBC stations and other foreign reporters during Kosovo War. Arkan blamed NATO for bombing of civilians and creating refugees of all ethnicities, and stated that he would deploy his troops only in the case of a NATO direct ground invasion. After the US Air Force's bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, killing three journalists, and which led to a diplomatic row between the USA and People’s Republic of China, NATO and various Western media claimed the building might had been targeted because the office of the Chinese military attaché was being used by Arkan to communicate and transmit messages to his "Tigers" in Kosovo.

The ensuing months after the end of Kosovo War, right up to the time of his murder, saw a long period of controversy, rumour and speculation, especially within Serbia, largely having to do with NATO's attempts to assassinate Arkan.[citation needed]

[edit] Murder and post-mortem fame

“ I'm not going to hide, I'm not going to surrender. ”

—Željko Ražnatović, 1999

[4]

Arkan was assassinated, on January 15, 2000, at 17:05 GMT in the lobby of the elite Intercontinental Hotel, Belgrade, in a location where he was surrounded by other hotel guests. The killer, Dobrosav Gavrić, was a 23-year-old police mobile brigade's junior member. Gavrić had ties to underworld and was on sick leave at the time. He walked up alone toward his target from behind. Arkan was seated and chatting with two of his friends. Gavrić waited for a few minutes, calmly walked up behind the party, and rapidly fired a succession of bullets from his CZ-99 duty-issued pistol. Arkan was shot from behind three times in the back of the head and lapsed into a coma on the spot. His bodyguard Zvonko Mateović put him into a car, and took him to a hospital. Doctors tried resuscitation for over one hour in vain, although they managed to revive him for a moment. Death was officially concluded at 18:50.

Arkan's companions, Milenko Mandić, a business manager, and Dragan Garić, a police inspector, were also shot to death by Gavrić. Gavrić was shot and wounded immediately after by Arkan's bodyguard, Zvonko Mateović, and fell unconscious. A woman bystander was seriously wounded in a shootout between the two as well. After complicated surgery, Gavrić survived, but remained disabled and confined to a wheelchair as result of a spinal wound.

Željko Ražnatović Arkan was buried with military honors by his volunteers and with a Serbian Orthodox church mourning ceremonial on January 20, 2000. Around 20,000 people attended the funeral.

After Arkan's violent death all of Arkan's numerous enemies celebrated, including statements to the effect that he "got what he deserved" and "died in the same manner as he lived". Another faction, trying to allege their moderation or moral superiority or both, stated that they preferred to see him on trial in The Hague. In reaction to the death, Serb sentiments varied across the political spectrum, but almost all were shocked by the news. Pro-West Serbs consider Arkan a shame for their nation; for them, he reflects an insane bandit and erratic warlord. For others, Arkan represents an ultimate patriot and heroic legend.

Speculation and controversy continue to surround the life of Željko Ražnatović long after his death.

[edit] Trials and rumours

Gavrić pleaded innocent and never admitted to committing the crime. He was found guilty and sentenced to 19 years in prison. His accomplices received from 3 to 15 years each, after a year-long trial in 2002. However the district court verdict was overturned by the Supreme Court because of a lack of evidence and the vagueness of the first trial process.

A new trial was conducted in 2006, ending on October 9, 2006 with guilty verdicts for Gavrić as well as his accomplices Milan Đurišić and Dragan Nikolić. Each man received 30 years in prison.[3]

However, the identities of the person(s) who ordered the murder and the background remain unclear and subject to speculation. According to one rumour, Marko Milošević, the son of Yugoslavia's president, Slobodan Milošević, was said to have had a harsh quarrel with Arkan over oil-smuggling control.

Another rumour alleges that Rade Marković ordered his outside operative Andrija Drašković to find killers and coordinate the rest of the mission. The rumour goes on that Drašković then hired his fellow gangsters Dragan "Gagi" Nikolić and Zoran "Skole" Uskoković, while Dragan Nikolić further brought his friend Dobrosav Gavrić and relative Milan Đuričić into the secret mission as they supposedly were individuals in whom Gagi had full confidence (Đuričić was his first cousin while Gavrić was his best man). Together with Skole and his gang they secretly planned and organized Arkan's murder in his apartment.

Yet another rumour that floats around claims that Borislav Pelević, Arkan's close associate and his successor as president of Party of Serbian Unity, served as inside man for the plot against his boss. Security services also wiretapped Arkan shortly before his murder; for four months the group followed Arkan's movements and whereabouts, learning his habits.

After Arkan's death his lawyer claimed that Arkan was killed by British Special Boat Service.

[edit] Personal

Arkan was married to a Serbian turbo-folk singer Svetlana Raznatovic aka Ceca, nee Velickovic, born on 6-14-1973. www.ceca-online.com

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Football Hooligans, and War", Ivan Čolović, Central European University Press, 2000.
  2. ^ Arkan: "I'm not going to hide". BBC (1 April 1999).
  3. ^ Arkan: "I'm not going to hide". BBC (1 April 1999).
  4. ^ Arkan: "I'm not going to hide". BBC (1 April 1999).
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