Ante Gotovina | |
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 Gotovina in 2015, at a ceremony marking the 20th anniversary ofOperation Storm. | |
| Nickname | Andrija Grabovac |
| Born | (1955-10-12)12 October 1955 (age 70) |
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| Service years | 1973–2000 |
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Ante Gotovina (born 12 October 1955) is a Croatian retiredlieutenant general and formerFrenchsenior corporal who served in theCroatian War for Independence.[1] He is noted for his primary role in the 1995Operation Storm. In 2001, theInternational Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) indicted him onwar crimes andcrimes against humanity charges in connection with that operation and its aftermath.[2] After spending four years in hiding, he was captured in theCanary Islands in December 2005.[3]
On 15 April 2011, Gotovina was found guilty on 8 of the 9 counts of the indictment and sentenced to 24 years of imprisonment. On 16 November 2012, Gotovina's convictions were overturned by an appeals panel at theInternational Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and he was released from custody.[4][5][6]
Ante Gotovina was born inTkon on the island ofPašman. His father Milan tried to move with his mother toItaly, but was caught by the Yugoslav border police. His mother was released while his father spent time in prison. When Gotovina was nearly four, his mother was killed saving him from an explosion at a construction site. Subsequently, his father went to work inZagreb, while Gotovina and his siblings went to live with their maternal grandfather Šime inPakoštane.[7] Around Easter of 1971, Gotovina and his friend Srećko tried to escape by sailing away.[8] Rough seas caused by a storm forced them back and they soon returned to Pakoštane. Gotovina kept his escape attempt from his family and continued to attend school for electrical engineering inZadar.[9]
At the age of sixteen, Gotovina left home to become a sailor. In 1973, before turning eighteen, he joined theFrench Foreign Legion under thepseudonym ofAndrija Grabovac and became a member of the2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment (2e REP) after qualifying at the Training School inPau before joining the eliteCommandos de Recherche et d'Action en Profondeur (CRAP) now renamed asParachute Commando Group (GCP). It was there he met Dominique Erulin, brother of the ColonelPhilippe Erulin, who became his friend and partner in future missions.[10] In the next few years, he participated in Foreign Legion operations inDjibouti, theBattle of Kolwezi inZaire, and missions in theIvory Coast, becoming Colonel Erulin's driver. After five years of service, he left the Legion with the rank ofcaporal-chef; he obtained French citizenship in 1979.[1][11]
He subsequently worked for a variety of French private security companies during the 1980s, among them KO International Company, a filial orsubsidiary of VHP Security, known as a cover for theService d'Action Civique (SAC), and was at this time responsible for the security of far-right politicianJean-Marie Le Pen.[12][13] In 1981, together with Dominique Erulin, he helped editorJean-Pierre Mouchard (a close friend ofJean-Marie Le Pen) organize a commando operation to free his press inLa Seyne-sur-Mer, occupied byCGT trade-union strikers.[12][13]
According to French police records, he became involved in criminal activities, which led to arrest warrants being issued forrobbery andextortion; it has been reported that he served at least one two-year prison sentence, though this has been denied by his attorneys.[14]
Towards the end of the decade, he moved to South America, where he provided training to a number of right-wingparamilitary organizations, notably inArgentina andGuatemala.[15] He met his first wife Ximena Dalel inColombia, and they had a daughter.[16]
Arrested during a trip to France,[further explanation needed] he was sentenced in 1986 to five years in prison by Paris'Cour d'assises.[17] He was freed the following year, "in circumstances showing he had been benefiting from very particular protections".[12][18]
Dominique Erulin disputed the verdict against Gotovina and himself, and claims Gotovina's criminal record was manufactured by left-wing factions allied withPresidentFrançois Mitterrand.[10] Gotovina's lawyers submitted a brief to theInternational War Crimes Tribunal alleging that Gotovina had been framed by an alleged criminal police group loyal toFrançois Mitterrand.[19]
Gotovina returned to Croatia in 1991, at the dawn ofCroatian War of Independence, and enlisted in theCroatian National Guard (ZNG), the first organized military body of what would laterbecome theCroatian Army. He was an efficient commander and had the advantage – shared by relatively few other Croatian soldiers – of combat experience. He fought in westernSlavonia: inNovska andNova Gradiška,[20] attached to the1st Guards Brigade.[21] He soon caught the attention of his superiors, and when theCroatian Army was established as such in 1992, Gotovina was promoted to the rank ofcolonel.[20] As a colonel, he was one of the main organizers ofOperation Maslenica, which restored Croatia's territorial continuity in Dalmatia.[20]
By 1994, he had risen to the rank ofmajor-general and, as ageneral-pukovnik and commanding officer of theSplit military district he organized key military operations: the defense ofLivno andTomislavgrad from the troops of Bosnian Serb generalRatko Mladić, and the ten-month war of attrition which broke the Serb defenses in the Plain of Livno, theDinara Ridge and theŠator mountain.[2][20] He led the conquest ofGlamoč andBosansko Grahovo (Operation Summer '95), which enabled him to close from the east the encirclement ofKnin, the capital of the self-declared (1991–95)Republic of Serbian Krajina.[22] This ensured conditions for the rapid success of OperationOluja ("Storm") in 4–6 August 1995, during which forces under his command capturedKnin.[23]
Gotovina was then immediately put in charge of the combined forces of the Croatian Army (Hrvatska Vojska or HV) and the Croatian Defense Council in Bosnia (Hrvatsko Vijeće Obrane or HVO) inOperation Mistral 2, which defeated the army of the Bosnian Serbs and led the Croatian army, together with theArmy of Bosnia-Herzegovina, within 23 kilometres ofBanja Luka and was only stopped under American pressure.[1][page needed]
In 1996, he became the chief of the Army Inspectorate.[24] In September 2000, he was a signatory to theTwelve Generals' Letter in which the government ofIvica Račan was criticised. Together with some of the other generals, he was forced to retire by presidentStjepan Mesić, with an explanation that military officers shouldn't write political letters if not approved by the supreme commander.[25]
In July 2001, theInternational Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) issued sealed indictments to the Croatian government seeking the arrest of Ante Gotovina andMladen Markač for war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly committed between 4 August 1995 and 15 November 1995.[2] Gotovina was indicted together with Markač, a former commander of the special police of Croatia's interior ministry, andIvan Čermak, assistant defense minister from 1991 to 1993. The three were accused of "aiding and abetting the murders of 324 Krajina Serb civilians and prisoners of war by shooting, burning and/or stabbing" them and "forcibly displacing almost 90,000 Serb civilians". Gotovina was charged with five counts of crimes against humanity (persecutions, deportation, inhumane acts, murder) and four counts of violations of the laws or customs of war (plunder, wanton destruction, murder, cruel treatment). He denied all charges.[26]
For four years, 2001–2005, Gotovina remained at large despite intense pressure from theUnited States and theEuropean Union for his surrender. Foreign countries sought to hunt down Gotovina, and anInterpol warrant was issued for his arrest. The United States announced a $5 million (€4.2 million) reward for his capture.[27] The BritishSecret Intelligence Service (MI6) was reported in Croatian media in 2004 to have been allowed to import sophisticated monitoring equipment to track down Gotovina.[28] This caused resentment among elements of Croatia's security establishment; as a result, MI6 officers based in Croatia under cover were exposed in the Croatian media, allegedly at the behest of Gotovina's sympathisers in Croatia's counter-intelligence service, the POA (Protuobavještajna agencija).[28] Prior to that, a number of Croatian security officials were sacked, including POA head Franjo Turek,[29] who was replaced by Joško Podbevšek and shortly afterwards byTomislav Karamarko.[30] The wiretapping operation went ahead after Turek's retirement in March 2004, under his successor at the POA, but failed to locate Gotovina before a deadline set by the Croatian prime ministerIvo Sanader in June 2004. According to a leaked memo from MI6 to the POA, the UK government had called for Turek's arrest, unless he started to cooperate on Gotovina.[29]
Several EUmember states, including the UK and theNetherlands, made the surrender of Gotovina a precondition for Croatia'saccession to the European Union.[31] This stance was criticised by the Croatian government, which claimed ignorance of Gotovina's whereabouts but that he was probably outside the country and that it was doing all it could to bring him to justice. Accession negotiations with the EU, scheduled to start on 17 March 2005, were postponed pending a resolution of the issue.[32]
In September 2005, ICTY's chief prosecutorCarla Del Ponte claimed she had information that he was hiding in aFranciscan monastery in Croatia or in Bosnian Croat territory.[33] She went to the Vatican to ask for help in locating him, but toldThe Daily Telegraph that the Vatican Secretary for Relations with States, ArchbishopGiovanni Lajolo, had refused to help, telling her that the Vatican was not a state and thus had "no international obligations".[34] Her comments infuriated the Church in Croatia[35] as well as the Vatican, whose spokesmanJoaquín Navarro-Valls said the archbishop asked Del Ponte what evidence she had for her claims but which she reportedly did not provide.[36]
On 7 December 2005, Gotovina was captured bySpanish police and special forces in the resort ofPlaya de las Américas onTenerife in theCanary Islands. He was reported to have been traveling on two fake Croatian passports using the names, Goran Drozdek and Stjepan Seničić.[37] His passport contained border stamps of several countries, includingArgentina,Chile,Russia,China,Czech Republic andTahiti.[38] A sum of money amounting to€12,000 was discovered in his room.[27] He was immediately flown toMadrid, where he was imprisoned in advance of a court hearing to extradite him to the ICTY prison atThe Hague. Spanish police were later reported to have been tracking him for several days, apparently following a lead obtained through thewiretapping of his wife Dunja's phone.[37]
The involvement of Croatian authorities was backed up by the Carla's List documentary, a part of which is available on YouTube. Croatian media creditedJosip Buljević (subsequently theSOA's director, later presidentKolinda Grabar-Kitarović's national security advisor[39] and since January 2016defence minister) with being in charge of the operation to locate and arrest Gotovina.[40]
On 10 December 2005, Gotovina was flown to The Hague, where he appeared before the ICTY on 12 December. He pleaded not guilty to the seven charges brought against him, for acting individually and/or through ajoint criminal enterprise in persecutions, deportation and forced displacement and other inhumane acts for a total of four counts ofcrimes against humanity; and murder, plunder of property and wanton destruction of settlements in three counts of violations of thelaws or customs of war.[41] According to his lawyer, Gotovina has declared that he is "not the man described in each and every count."[42]
Many Croats continued to regard Gotovina as a war hero and rejected the assertion that he was guilty of crimes.[43][44] Major parties in Croatia were reported to be using Gotovina as a means of drumming up political support in the run-up to the 2007parliamentary election.[45]
During his flight, Gotovina became a prominent icon of Croatian popular culture.Marko Perković andMiroslav Škoro, two popular Croatian musicians, recorded songs with lyrics implicitly praising the general and his flight, and both songs became huge hits, especially among younger fans.[46] In 2006, the two most popular football teams in the country,Dinamo Zagreb andHajduk Split, played a match, whose proceeds went to help finance the generals' legal fees.[47][48]
In March 2005, a survey conducted on behalf of the U.S. Embassy in Croatia reported that a majority of those surveyed thought it was not in Croatia's interest to extradite Gotovina.[48] Unofficial polls by television programs also showed strong support, with most callers saying that they would prefer Gotovina remain at large even if it meant not joining the European Union.[48]
In 2001, the Croatian writerNenad Ivanković wrote a biography of Gotovina,Warrior-Adventurer and General (A Biography). The Croatian filmmakerDejan Šorak wrote and directedTwo Players from the Bench (Dva igrača s klupe), ablack comedy released in 2005 whose plot was inspired by the events surrounding the indictments against Gotovina.[49] Jack Baric, an Emmy Award winning Croatian-American filmmaker madeSearching for a Storm, a documentary film about Gotovina's case and the war in Croatia. The film had its world premiere in 2009 at the Zagreb Dox Film Festival.[50]
After Gotovina's arrest in Spain, several rallies and protests took place in Croatian cities. On 11 December 2005 (the first Sunday after his arrest), a rally organised by war veterans attracted between 40,000 and 70,000 Croatians in the city ofSplit to protest the arrest.[51][52] Several retired generals attended the rally and expressed their support for Gotovina. On the same day, rallies were held in several other cities in Croatia, but with smaller attendance (inZagreb some 500 people gathered).[53]
Polls taken by the PULS Agency after Gotovina's arrest showed that almost two-thirds of the Croatian public found the accusations baseless.[54]
At the end of 2006, Gotovina's case was combined with cases of Ivan Čermak and Mladen Markač, as they all relate to Operation Storm.[55] TheTrial of Gotovina et al was expected to begin in May 2007 but was postponed indefinitely because of conflicts between lawyers on the defence bench.[56] His lawyers wereLuka Misetic, an American attorney of Croatian descent,[57] Greg Kehoe, an American lawyer who advised the prosecution in theIraqi Special Tribunal case againstSaddam Hussein,[58] andPayam Akhavan, former Legal Advisor to the Prosecutor's Office of the ICTY.[2][59]
After the 2006 death ofSlobodan Milošević, Gotovina signed a condolence note to his family (together withMladen Naletilić Tuta,Ivica Rajić and other Croat and Serb detainees, making the list 34 signatures long), which was published inBelgrade'sPolitika andVečernje novosti newspapers. Gotovina's attorney stated that he signed because of his Catholic faith, which stresses forgiveness.[60]
The trial began on 11 March 2008,[61] and it concluded in September 2010 with the delivery of closing arguments.[62] Misetic said that he expected a verdict in two to 10 months' time, as had been the case with the tribunal's decisions to date.[63]
On 15 April 2011, Gotovina was found guilty on 8 of the 9 counts of the indictment and sentenced to 24 years of imprisonment.[64]
He was convicted of "committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, including murder, deportation, persecution and inhuman acts" and Presiding JudgeAlphons Orie cited several witness testimonies in the decision.[65]
In the Gotovina Defence Final Trial Brief,[66] a 315-page document, Gotovina's lawyers rejected the accusation of mass expulsion of Serbian population as well as the accusation of unlawful shelling of civilian areas, saying that the "HV used artillery solely against military objectives in a highly professional operation consistent with well-established military doctrine".[citation needed]
In Zagreb, Croatia's capital, thousands gathered to watch the sentence being given out live on large screens and loudly protested the decision.[67] Croatian prime ministerJadranka Kosor stated the idea of a "joint criminal enterprise" was "unacceptable".[67] War veterans staged a march in the Croatian capital in protest.[68] About 10,000 showed up to the march, chanting slogans against the Kosor-led government and the EU as protesters removed and ripped apart theEU flag from a flagpole at the main square, replacing it with theCroatian flag.[69]
A poll conducted immediately after the verdict showed that 95.4% of Croatians felt the judgment against Gotovina was unjust and that 88% still saw him as a hero. Support for Croatia's entry into theEuropean Union plummeted to 23.8%.[70] In June 2011, Gotovina was ranked the second most creditable person for the creation of an independent Croatian state in a poll conducted byVečernji list.[71]
On 16 November 2012, Gotovina was found not guilty by three votes against two by the Appeals Panel of the ICTY, presided over byTheodor Meron.[72] The previous verdict had sentenced him to 24 years in prison whileMladen Markač was sentenced to 18 years. Both of them were accused of being part of the "criminal enterprise" but the Court concluded there was no such conspiracy.[73]
On 15 November, the night before the verdict, candle-lit vigils were held across Croatia, including at Catholic churches.[74] Gotovina and Markač were supported by numerous Croatian veterans, and some marched from Zagreb'sMirogoj cemetery to theZagreb Cathedral.[73]
Gotovina's acquittal provoked mixed international reactions. Croatian Prime MinisterZoran Milanović reacted positively,[75] as did the Croatian presidentIvo Josipović.[76]
Serbian PresidentTomislav Nikolić reacted negatively,[77] as did Serbian government ministerRasim Ljajić[78] and Prime MinisterIvica Dačić[79] and much of the Serbian media.[80]
TheSerbian government froze its relations with the Tribunal.[81] On the other hand,Veselin Šljivančanin congratulated the generals on their release and blamed the political leaders instead.[82]
Reactions inBosnia and Herzegovina were mixed: positive reactions came from the President of theFederation of Bosnia and HerzegovinaŽivko Budimir[83] and Croatian politicianDragan Čović,[84][85] while the President ofRepublika SrpskaMilorad Dodik responded negatively.[86]
The case raised significant issues forlaw of war and it has been described as a precedent.[87][88][89][90][91][92]Carla del Ponte, former Chief Prosecutor of ICTY, was described as shocked by the verdict.[93]Ivan Šimonović, former Croatian minister of justice and current UN Assistant Secretary-General for human rights, said that the verdict would have an important role in interpretation of some regulations of international criminal law.[94] Serbian politicianVuk Jeremić, President of theUN General Assembly, criticized the ICTY onTwitter.[95] and in responsescheduled a UN GA session to discuss the work of the ad-hoc Tribunals set up by UN.
After the generals' release, the Croatian government dispatched the governmentalBombardier Challenger 600 plane along with the Minister of Defence,Ante Kotromanović, and theMinister of Veterans' Affairs, Predrag Matić, to bring Gotovina and Markač to Croatia. In Zagreb, they were greeted by Prime MinisterZoran Milanović and the Speaker of ParliamentJosip Leko.[96] Around 100,000 people heard them speak at theBan Jelačić Square, after which CardinalJosip Bozanić held a mass for them at theZagreb Cathedral.[97] The two generals were then received by the President at thePresidential Palace where Gotovina said that the "Homeland War is now clean, it belongs to our history, it is a basis on which we build our future."[98][99]
Matić said that Gotovina and Markač are amongst the candidates for a new highestCroatian decoration.[100]
On 19 November 2012, the Belgrade-based tabloidKurir ran an interview with Gotovina, who urged Serbs displaced after Operation Storm to return to Croatia.[101][102]
On 23 November 2012, Gotovina became an honorary citizen ofSplit[103] and the next day he became an honorary citizen ofZadar.[104] On 2 December he was named honorary citizen ofOsijek along with Markač.[105]
In November 2012, Serbia's government requested that the ICTY transfer the evidence against both generals to them for their own investigation.[106] In January 2013, Serbia's War Crimes Prosecutor Vladimir Vukčević said that the acquittal was final and a review of the case was impossible.[why?][107]
On 7 January 2014, it was announced that Gotovina had filed a lawsuit against theU.S. Department of Treasury to lift economic sanctions imposed against him, which had been in place for more than a decade, listing Gotovina as a Specially Designated National in 2003, subject to economic sanctions.[108] On 6 February, the Federal Register announced Gotovina's removal from the list.[109]
In 2019,The General, abiographical film about Gotovina's life based on Nenad Ivanković's bookWarrior-Adventurer and General (A Biography) was released. It was directed byAntun Vrdoljak and starredGoran Višnjić as Gotovina.[110]
Vuk Jeremic, the UN General Assembly chairman and former Serbian foreign minister, lost his cool on his Twitter account
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| New office | Commander of the Split Military District 1992–1996 | Unknown |
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