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Dr. Dorothy McClellan

IN VUKOVAR AFTER 34 YEARS

THE REMAINS OF SLAVKO BATIK FOUND

After almost 34 years, the family can say goodbye to Slavko Batik, who they have been searching for since 1991. His wife and daughter identified his remains in Vukovar. In all, the remains of 16 people are being identified. Slavko Batik, a salesman in a hardware store in the city center, was one of the civilians who disappeared in the fall of 1991.

The photograph of Slavko Batik, taken on November 16, 1991 on Proleterska Street in the Sajmište district of Vukovar, has been seen around the world. It shows five people walking down a destroyed street. The stance, face and appearance of the hunched Batik, who walks leaning on a cane while four Serbian JNA and Chetnik soldiers surround him, faithfully depicts all the suffering that the people of Vukovar faced. He looks tortured and exhausted. Scars, bruises and redness are visible on his face, his arm and leg are bandaged. His hair is thin from burns. His trousers are dirty and muddy. He was only 48 years old.

The video also shows a person with a military helmet on his head, and that is Slobodan Rajić Buba, a Serbian, a member of the JNA. In the photo, he is dressed in an SMB uniform, has a weapon in his hands, and two hand grenades are hanging from his belt.

The image speaks and confirms what has been denied all along, which is that Serbian JNA soldiers worked closely with Serbian Chetniks and together committed great crimes throughout Vukovar.

Serbian Slobodan Rajić was sentenced to a mere two and a half years in prison in a court in Vukovar for crimes against the civilian population!

– He is guilty of having found and captured civilian Slavko Batik, aged 48, in a destroyed house on Drvena Pijaca Square on November 16, 1991, as a member of the Serbian Chetniks dressed in a JNA uniform, armed with a semi-automatic rifle, with three other “unknown members of the Serbian Chetniks.” Slavko Batik was obviously ill and in serious mental and physical condition. Rajic took him to a house on what was then Proleterska Street and handed him over to unknown members of the JNA and Chetnik units, unlawfully deprived him of his liberty and imprisoned him, after which he disappeared without a trace, the court verdict states.

Batik was a man who would never harm anyone. He liked to joke. He greeted customers with a smile and a story. When you needed to buy something in that shop, you didn’t say go to the hardware store, but you said: “Go to Slavko.” I think most of the people of Vukovar knew him. During the trial, I read that Slobodan Rajić himself said that he knew Slavko from the city, who was not a military recruit, but a civilian. As a civilian, he was killed and disappeared in his Vukovar – Danijel Rehak, the president of the Croatian Association of Serbian Concentration Camp Inmates and the Center for War Crimes Research, told Večernji List newspaper a few years ago, remembering Slavko Batik.

With the end of the war and peaceful reintegration, the Serb Rajić left Vukovar and went to Novi Sad, where he still lives today. Speaking about the events of that day, November 16, Rajić said that Batik looked wounded and sick, but he was convinced and thought it was normal that he would be helped. He didn’t ask anyone, nor did he intend to ask, what happened to Batik afterwards, nor did anyone ask him about him. He believes that he acted on orders and took Slavko “from point A to point B”. Given the time he spent in custody, Rajić was released shortly after the trial ended!

A photo of Slavko Batik, taken on November 16, 1991, in Proleterska Street in the Sajmište district of Vukovar, went around the world.

16 victims identified

On Friday, April 4, 2025, 16 new victims of the missing and those killed in 1991 were identified at the Vukovar National Memorial Hospital Dr. Juraj Njavre. In addition to family members of the victims, the identification was attended by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Croatian Veterans Tomo Medved and the Chief State Attorney Ivan Turudić.

Among those identified were nine Croatian veterans and seven civilian victims, including three women. The victims range in age from 22 to 68 and were all exhumed from a mass grave found in May 2024 at the Vukovar landfill in Petrovac Valley. They all disappeared in the fall of 1991 during the aggression on Vukovar, and were last seen in several locations: in the Velepromet hangars, in Negoslavci, where they were brought from the Vukovar hospital, and some were taken from the Jakobovac Farm and Ristićev Salaš, and from their homes in Sajmište.

"These are difficult human destinies that leave no one indifferent, but they are also clear indicators of the scale of the crimes committed. And that is why the Chief State Attorney, who has been following the research at Petrovac Valley since the beginning, is with us today," said Medved, adding that the mass grave at Petrovac Valley clearly demonstrates all the brutality and callousness of the Greater Serbian aggressors.

"The victims we find there were killed in other locations, and then they were moved to that garbage dump, with the clear aim of covering up the crime," he told reporters in a statement at Petrovačka dola. He recalled that a detailed search of the location began in April 2022, and two years later, in May 2024, the remains of the victims were found. This was also the reason for the suspension of waste disposal at that location, which is still being searched, was requested.

This is the most demanding and longest-researched location of the mass grave, as shown by the following indicators: in 590 working days - more than 110,000 cubic meters of various garbage and waste were excavated, inspected and exported, and the mountain of asbestos was also removed, said Medved. "After two full years of daily tireless and dedicated work in the field, under a pile of waste that also contained animal bones, more than 2,000 fragmented bone parts were found on about 400 square meters, which were then carefully exhumed so that not a single bone would remain, and the exhumation itself lasted almost two months," he said.

Chief State Attorney Ivan Turudić emphasized that this discovery confirms the perseverance in searching for missing persons. "We will never tire because it is the hardest thing for you families, and we are here to serve you. Today, the uncertainties for 16 families will end. Whether this is a relief or even greater pain is difficult to say. May God give you the strength to endure this too," Turudić said to the families of the victims.