JASENOVAC RESEARCH INSTITUTE

PO BOX 10-0674 BROOKLYN, NY 11210 USA

Contact: Fax/Tel.: 718-338-2576 www.jasenovac.org

PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

17 APRIL 2005

FIRST MONUMENT TO VICTIMS OF JASENOVAC IS UNVEILED IN NEW YORK CITY'S

HOLOCAUST PARK AT JASENOVAC DAY CEREMONIES

On Sunday April 17, 2005 the first public monument ever established for the

Jasenovac death camp outside of former Yugoslavia was unveiled at ceremonies

marking the 60th anniversary of the end of the Holocaust held at the Holocaust

memorial Park in Brooklyn, NY. Some 200 attended the ceremonies including U.S.

Congressman Anthony Weiner, New York City Ombudsman Ralph Perfetto, Radio

Commentator Barry Farber, eight Survivors and Jewish Partisan fighters from

Yugoslavia, and diplomats representing three countries: Israel, Serbia & Montenegro,

and Bosnia & Herzegovina.

The Mayor of New York City, Hon. Michael Bloomberg, officially proclaimed

April 17, 2005 as "Jasenovac Day of Commemoration throughout New York City" in a

decree issued on April 14th. Greetings were read from President Tadic and

Prime Minister Kostunica of Serbia.

At the ceremony John Ranz, Buchenwald Survivor, wartime Partisan and JRI

Director, noted that it was "an historic day … for from this day forward Serbian

and Roma victims of the Holocaust shall forever be remembered with their fellow

Jewish brothers and sisters with whom they shared the same fate, and the same

graves." The monument was established through the efforts of the Jasenovac

Research Institute which has organized the annual Jasenovac Day of Commemoration

at the park for the past four years.

The Roma organization Voice of Roma sent a delegation to the ceremony and

spoke to the audience praising the monument and the Holocaust Park and

criticizing other institutions for failing to pay sufficient attention to Roma and other

non-Jewish victims of the Holocaust.

On behalf of the Survivors and victims' families, JRI Founder Barry Lituchy

thanked the Mayor, Congressman Weiner, and New York Ombudsman Ralph Perfetto

for their help in obtaining the monument. Holocaust Park founders Pauline and

Ira Bilus warmly welcomed the participants and the inclusion of Jasenovac on an

equal footing with Auschwitz, Dachau and Buchenwald. A letter from U.S.

Holocaust Memorial Museum Chairman Fred Zeidman did the same. On behalf of the New

York City Public Advocate's office, Ralph Perfetto awarded the Jasenovac

Research Institute and the Holocaust Park Committee special awards "For

Extraordinary Service to New York City." The awards were received by Barry Lituchy and

Pauline Bilus.

Religious services were conducted by Father Djokan Majstorovic of St. Sava's

Serbian Orthodox Church in New York who also blessed the monument. After

Father Djokan, Rabbi Dr. Ephraim Isaac, a member of the JRI Advisory Board and head

of the Department of Semitic Studies at Princeton University, also said

Kaddish for the victims. In an equally moving ceremony the names of dozens of

victims of the Jasenovac camp and the Holocaust in Yugoslavia were read while seven

large candles were lit for each hundred thousand of the estimated 700,000

victims of Jasenovac. The first candle was lit by one of the Roma participants in

memory of the many tens of thousands of Roma victims. Another candle was lit

by a nine year old Serbian girl at the ceremony in memory of the many tens of

thousands of Serbian, Jewish and Roma children brutally exterminated at

Jasenovac. Elisa Gutman lit a candle in memory of her father killed at Jasenovac

while Anna Beck lit another in memory of the Jews from other parts of Yugoslavia

killed by German, Croatian, Muslim and Albanian fascists. A seven foot wreath

was placed next to the monument and many lit individual candles to remember

victims.

Anna Beck spoke movingly prior to the candle lighting of how she personally

witnessed the mass murder of Jews and Serbs on the frozen Danube River in Novi

Sad in January 1942. Ricki Danon Soltan and Michael Danon recalled how they

survived, while their fathers were murdered in Jasenovac along with many other

members of their family. Alexandar Mosic spoke on behalf of fellow Jewish

Partisans and Survivors from former Yugoslavia. Survivor Eva Deutsch Costabel

recalled how members of her family were killed by the Ustashe.

The Ambassador of Bosnia and Hercegovina to the U.S., H.E. Igor Davidovic,

spoke movingly about the murder of his grandfather at Jasenovac. Dan Kapner,

representing the State of Israel, warmly congratulated the JRI and all

participants for the establishment of the Jasenovac monument and reminded all of the

dire need to strengthen our remembrance activities in the face of growing threats

from anti-Semitism, racism and neo-Nazism. Reflecting JRI's commitment to

furthering education about the Holocaust in Yugoslavia, Lituchy announced the

winner of the JRI's first annual Jasenovac Essay Contest - Alexander Osman of

Hopewell Junior High School in Aliquippa, PA., who will receive a $500 prize for

his work.

A small Croatian group arrived toward the end of the ceremonies. The state of

Croatia was not formally invited on this occasion because the monument was

not engraved until April 12th. However, Croatia will be invited to participate

next year.

JRI Founder Barry Lituchy reminded the participants that justice and

recognition for the victims of the Holocaust in Yugoslavia has not come without hard

struggle: "The lessons of the Holocaust were bitterly learned and on this day

we must remind ourselves of them as we honor the victims. The victims speak to

us still, reminding us "Da Se Ne Zaboravi!" ("So that you may not forget!").

On April 17th we did not forget - we honored our martyrs in a manner they long

deserved, with a permanent monument, forever."