Dissenters from the “Croatian Orthodox Church” and collaborators from the Croatian Commonwealth of Orthodox Veterans intensified their agitation among the Serbs of Croatia in anticipation of the country’s population census, scheduled for September 13 of this year.
Tanyug reports this, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
According to available information, the Croatian census will take place on September 13 for those who intend to physically take part in it, and on September 27 it is planned to be held for those who want to complete the process remotely, via the Internet. At the same time, posters appeared throughout Croatia showing the filled-in lines: “Croatian,” “Orthodox,” “Croatian Orthodox Church.”
One of the founders of the Croatian Commonwealth of Orthodox Veterans (a small number of Serbs who fought against their fellow tribesmen on the side of the Croatian neo-Ustashe separatists during the war of the 90s) Goran Matsura, whose Facebook profile is decorated with an Ustashe greeting Za sun ready! (Ready for the Fatherland!), stated that 80 similar propaganda posters were placed throughout the country.
“The Serbian Orthodox Church is an instrument of the policy of Greater Serbia,” the collaborator commented on his actions. “Croatia will not become a fully independent state until the Croatian Orthodox Church is revived.”
It should be noted that the so-called Croatian Orthodox Church was created in 1941 on the initiative of the Ustashe leadership of the Independent Croatian State in order to assimilate that part of the Serbs that could not be destroyed simply due to the lack of technical capabilities for this. It is characteristic that the collaborationist formation, unrecognized by any of the Orthodox churches, was headed by Archbishop of the ROCOR Hermogenes Maximov, who was expelled from the ROCOR Synod of Bishops for this and banned from serving. After the victory of the Yugoslav partisans, the KhOC was destroyed. The revival of the schismatics took place in 2013, when they proclaimed autocephaly, declaring that their flock included 17 thousand Croatian citizens.
Tellingly, until recently, belonging to the Serbs, Croats and Bosniaks in the Balkans was determined solely on a confessional basis, which is explained by the fact that all three peoples, who are in difficult relationships with each other, have common roots, language and history.