Assassination of Ante Pavelić

Assassination of Ante Pavelić
Part of the aftermath of World War II in Yugoslavia
Pavelić after the assassination attempt
DateApril 10, 1957 (1957-04-10)
LocationBuenos Aires, Argentina
TypeAssassination by shooting
TargetAnte Pavelić
PerpetratorUDBA
Organized by Yugoslavia
ParticipantsBlagoje Jovović
OutcomeAnte Pavelić eventually dies from complications from gunshot wounds on 28 December 1959
Deaths1

Ante Pavelić, the dictator of the Independent State of Croatia who fled Yugoslavia through the ratlines, was shot on April 10, 1957 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He died two years later from wounds sustained in the assassination attempt.

Background

After the end of World War II, several members of the NDH government were executed after a one-day trial in Zagreb on 6 June 1945. Shortly after this, Pavelić moved to Austria.[1] There, he remained for a few months before fleeing to Rome, where the Catholic Church sheltered him despite his condition as a war criminal (as evidenced in declassified documents from United States intelligence agencies).[2] Briefly detained by the British in Austria, he was released.[3]

Ante Pavelić arrived in the Italian capital in 1946, disguised as a monk and with a Spanish passport.[4] Croatian-run San Girolamo degli Illirici College aided exiled Ustaše, and Pavelić sheltered there and in other locations around Rome until 1948.[5][4] The United States secret services knew that he was living in Rome but were not interested in the arrest of any anti-communist from Eastern Europe, due to the growing tension with the Soviet bloc.[4] After considering his arrest, the possible loss of sympathies among the Ustaše émigrés led the military authorities to desist from arresting him.[4] Six months later, in November 1948,[4] he fled to Argentina,[6] on board the Italian ship Sestriere.[4] Pavelic had maintained correspondence with the Archbisop of Buenos Aires, Monsignor De Andrea. The Vatican provided assistance with obtaining false documents and a Red Cross-issued passport, and he assumed the identity of a Sicilian Jew to flee the country. De Andrea helped him evade immigration control once he reached Argentina.[7]

Assassination

According to the United States Department of State, the government of Marshal Josip Broz Tito attempted to assassinate Pavelić on two occasions, through the Yugoslav secret services (UDBA), surviving both attempts with injuries.[4]

On 10 April 1957 Pavelić was wounded in Buenos Aires by an assailant. Out of five shots, one hit his clavicle and a second hit near his spine, the rest missing.[8][9]

At that time he was reportedly sought by the UDBA, as well as by the Israeli Mossad.[10] As the Argentine government agreed to extradite him to Yugoslavia, he fled to Chile.[8] He then took refuge with his family in Spain, in Madrid, with the agreement of the Franco regime.[11]

Pavelić eventually died in 1959 from his injuries,[12] in obscurity, in a German hospital in Madrid.[6] Pope John XXIII sent him his personal blessing.[13]

The assassination is often attributed to Blagoje Jovović, a Serbian nationalist and Montenegrin émigré to Argentina.[8][9][14] Jovović was a participant in World War II, who initially fought for the Yugoslav Partisans and then the Chetniks.[9] Jovović first publicly made the claim that he was the assassin in 1999 upon returning for the first time to Yugoslavia and visiting Ostrog, where he met with the Metropolitan of Montenegro Amfilohije Radović.[15] His account was described in a book entitled Two Bullets for Pavelić („Два метка за Павелића”) by Tihomir-Tiho Burzanović.[16]

The lack of reliable information around the attempt makes it unclear if Jovović was working for the Yugoslav State Security Service, or if he was even the assassin.[14] The Yugoslav State Security Service was interested in silencing Pavelić through kidnapping or assassination, and many Croat émigrés blamed the Yugoslav state for the attempt.[14]

A 1992 book Pet hitaca u Pavelića by writer and publicist Đurica Labović describes a UDBA agent named "Žarko" as Pavelić's assassin, who was acting on instructions from the Yugoslav diplomatic and consular mission in Argentina.[16]

Aftermath

Pavelić was buried in the Saint Isidore cemetery[17] in Madrid. His grave became a place of homage for Nazi Croats. In 1996, Croatian footballer Davor Šuker was photographed in front of it.[18]

The Spanish state, however, did not provide sufficiently convincing proof of Pavelić's death: no photograph was released, nor could any Yugoslav official confirm his death; consequently, the Yugoslav state doubted this information until 1980, the year of Tito's death. Between 1981 and 1987, the Yugoslav authorities requested access to Pavelić's remains to confirm his death, without success. The dissolution of Yugoslavia into several states from 1991 put an end to these proceedings.

References

  1. ^ Delić 2011, p. 299.
  2. ^ "The Pavelić papers". Archived from the original on 22 May 2005. Retrieved 16 August 2010.
  3. ^ United States Department of State (1997), p. 5
  4. ^ a b c d e f g United States Department of State (1997), p. 7
  5. ^ Trifkovic 2011, p. 386.
  6. ^ a b Meneghello-Dincic, Kruno (1970). Les expériences yougoslaves d'industrialisation et de planification (in French). Éditions Cujas. p. 65.
  7. ^ Elin Mercedes-Tranchini (2013). Granja y Arado. Spenglerianos y fascistas en la Pampa 1910-1940. Buenos Aires: Dunken. p. 121. ISBN 978-9870266341
  8. ^ a b c Zander, Patrick G. (2020). Fascism through History: Culture, Ideology, and Daily Life. ABC-CLIO. p. 362. ISBN 978-1-44086-194-9.
  9. ^ a b c Tokić, Mate Nikola (2020). Croatian Radical Separatism and Diaspora Terrorism During the Cold War. Purdue University Press. pp. 57–58. ISBN 978-1-55753-892-5. The gunman fired five times, striking the poglavnik twice, once near the spine and once in the clavicle. The assailant was most likely Blagoje Jovović, a Montenegrin émigré to Argentina who, during World War II, had fought first with the Partisans and then the Četniks. By Jovović's own account-which he first made public in 1999-the would-be assassin acted independently of the Yugoslav or any other security services.
  10. ^ "Memorial plaque unveiled, street named in Belgrade after Ante Pavelić's assassin Blagoje Jovovic". telegraf.rs. 5 August 2020. Archived from the original on 8 April 2022. Retrieved 11 July 2021.
  11. ^ Pablo de Llano (3 April 2020). "Višnja Pavelić: The daughter of a Croatian dictator who lived as a recluse in Madrid". english.elpais.com. El Pais Semanal. Archived from the original on 15 January 2021. Retrieved 15 January 2021., translated by Heather Galloway
  12. ^ McCormick, Robert B. (2014). Croatia Under Ante Pavelić: America, the Ustase and Croatian Genocide. I.B. Tauris. pp. 178–180.
  13. ^ Rivelli, Marco Aurelio (1998). Le génocide occulté: État Indépendant de Croatie 1941–1945 [Hidden Genocide: The Independent State of Croatia 1941–1945] (in French). Lausanne: L'age d'Homme. p. 140. ISBN 9782825111529.
  14. ^ a b c Nielsen, Christian Axboe (2020). Yugoslavia and Political Assassinations: The History and Legacy of Tito’s Campaign Against the Emigrés. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 208. ISBN 9781788316866.
  15. ^ "Belgrade honours Montenegrin Chetnic for trying to kill head of Croatian Ustashi". N1 Belgrade. 30 July 2020. Archived from the original on 7 March 2025. Retrieved 11 January 2026.
  16. ^ a b Adžić, Novak (28 February 2023). "Četnička bajka o Blagoju Jovoviću". aktuelno.me. Archived from the original on 31 January 2026. Retrieved 11 January 2026.
  17. ^ Javier Jimeno. "Grave Ante Pavelić". TracesofWar.com. Retrieved 10 January 2020.
  18. ^ "Davor Šuker na grobu Ante Pavelića". Blic.rs (in Serbian). 2015-11-29. Archived from the original on 2024-09-16. Retrieved 2024-09-16.

Sources

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