- 6/14/2025
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00:30A quiet street in an Argentinian coastal resort.
00:37Nothing out of the ordinary.
00:44But early in 1998, the peaceful atmosphere is suddenly shattered
00:49as the world's press descends on the home of a 77-year-old Croatian called Dinko Sakić.
00:55An Argentinian police car takes Dinko Sakić on the first leg of a journey
01:04that will end in a courtroom back in his homeland, 6,000 miles away.
01:09The crimes for which Sakić now faces trial
01:12were committed more than half a century earlier, during World War II.
01:21At the time, Croatia was an ally of the Nazis
01:24and its leader, Ant Pavelic,
01:27modelled himself on Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini.
01:30As the war unfolded, Croatia was sucked into collaboration.
01:38And Dinko Sakić ended up as the commandant
01:41of one of the most notorious death camps of World War II,
01:45Yesenovac.
01:51Yesenovac became known as the Auschwitz of the Balkans.
01:54Here, Sakić carried out acts of torture and mass murder
02:01in the name of the Croatian people.
02:05Now, after more than 50 years on the run,
02:08justice has finally caught up with Dinko Sakić.
02:12But in his homeland, his case raised old and deep divisions.
02:18Dinko Sakić may be the man facing trial,
02:20but the horrifying deeds that he stands accused of
02:23cast a stain not only on the newly created country of Croatia,
02:26but also on the Roman Catholic Church.
02:31Can collaborating with the Nazis
02:33ever be justified in the name of freedom?
02:36And was Dinko Sakić an honourable freedom fighter
02:38or a sadistic war criminal?
02:41Look, I don't speak about what it was before or what it was after.
02:46But while I was there, no one could touch.
02:50No one could touch.
02:52No one could touch.
02:52No one could touch.
02:52November 1918, the end of World War I,
03:03and just three years before the birth of Dinko Sakić.
03:08Victorious Serbian troops make their way back to their capital, Belgrade.
03:13King Alexander of Serbia becomes the head of a new kingdom
03:16created out of the ruins of war.
03:19But it's a kingdom that is both complex and turbulent.
03:25As well as his own people, the Serbs,
03:27he was ruling over the Croats,
03:30the people of Slovenia,
03:33Bosnians,
03:35Kosovo Albanians,
03:37the people of Macedonia
03:38and Montenegro.
03:43These people had different religions,
03:45different histories,
03:46different cultures
03:47and even different languages.
03:51It was a dangerous and volatile mixture.
03:55King Alexander had to rule these disparate lands with a firm hand.
03:59He suppressed regional loyalties.
04:02Politicians hostile to the monarchy were sidelined,
04:05sometimes even imprisoned.
04:08In 1929, Alexander gave a new name to his kingdom.
04:18He called it Yugoslavia,
04:21the land of the southern Slavs.
04:24He then cracked down hard on political parties who opposed him,
04:28including a rising Croat nationalist called Ant Pavelic.
04:34Pavelic's brand of fiery nationalism
04:36places him in the forefront of Croatian politics.
04:42But Alexander's crackdown now forced him
04:44and his followers to flee to neighbouring Italy.
04:46Italy's leader was Benito Mussolini,
05:01then at the height of his power and popularity.
05:11Mussolini formed his fascist party after World War I
05:14by exploiting the grievances of soldiers returning from the front
05:17only to find mass unemployment.
05:21He organised them into armed squads known as the Blackshirts,
05:24who terrorised their political opponents.
05:29In 1922, Mussolini became Prime Minister of Italy.
05:33By the end of the decade, he had become dictator
05:36and set about re-establishing his country as a great European power.
05:42Mussolini suspended civil liberties and destroyed all opposition,
05:46all tactics that appeal to Pavelic.
05:49In 1935, he invaded Ethiopia and absorbed it into what he referred to as his new Italian Empire.
06:04He also provided military support to General Franco in the Spanish Civil War.
06:09Later, influenced by Adolf Hitler,
06:15Mussolini began to introduce anti-Jewish legislation into Italy.
06:24This was the perfect environment for Ant Pavelic
06:26to establish his own fascist movement.
06:30He called it the Ustasha.
06:33The word in Serbo-Croat means insurgent.
06:36For his part, Mussolini saw the Ustasha movement
06:45as a means to break up the Kingdom of Yugoslavia
06:48and to expand Italian influence in the Balkans.
06:52He placed money and weapons at Pavelic's disposal.
06:55Then, in October 1934, the Ustasha made their move.
07:08A hit squad was organised to attack their enemy, King Alexander.
07:12But they'd have to wait for their opportunity.
07:15It came when Alexander went to Marseille in the south of France
07:19on a state visit.
07:22The king and his French guests were greeted by the people of the city,
07:25completely unaware that fascist terrorists
07:27had infiltrated the crowd.
07:29The body of Alexander of Yugoslavia is to be borne through the city streets.
07:43The grief-stricken Queen Maria walks with her little son, King Peter.
08:02Behind them come notabilities of every country in Europe.
08:07Yugoslavia had lost its strongman.
08:09Alexander's heir, Peter, was just a boy.
08:14Too young and too weak to unite a country.
08:21For his involvement in Alexander's assassination,
08:24a French court sentenced Pavelic to death in his absence.
08:31But safe under Mussolini's protection,
08:33Pavelic and the Ustasha movement continue to thrive.
08:39And we have to stand together for this German country.
08:44Sieg heil!
08:45Heil!
08:47Heil!
08:49Heil!
08:50Heil!
08:51Heil!
08:53By now, Ant Pavelic had another potential ally.
08:57Adolf Hitler, the dictator of Nazi Germany.
09:00In the late 1930s, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini came together
09:07to form what became known as the Pact of Steel.
09:12Their alliance gave great hope to right-wing nationalists throughout Europe.
09:18Pavelic believed Italian fascism and German Nazism
09:20to be the wave of the future
09:22and the means by which Croatia would regain its freedom.
09:25His dream
09:30was of an independent Croatian state
09:32entirely free of foreigners like Serbs and Jews.
09:37It was extraordinarily attractive to many Croats,
09:40especially to a young man
09:41like Dinko Sakic.
09:44Fired up by Croatian nationalist zeal,
09:47Sakic was ready for action.
09:50It wasn't long in coming.
09:51On April 8, 1941, war came to Yugoslavia.
10:08In the previous 18 months, Nazi Germany had conquered Poland,
10:12most of Scandinavia and the whole of Western Europe.
10:18Now, it was Yugoslavia's turn.
10:21The Yugoslav army quickly collapsed
10:32and in just 11 days, the fighting was over
10:35and the Yugoslav monarchy fled.
10:43But in some parts of Yugoslavia,
10:50German troops were greeted as liberators.
11:00The arrival of German and Italian soldiers
11:03now allowed the underground Ustasha movement
11:05to seize power in the Croat capital, Zagreb.
11:09The local population, Kroats, I would say,
11:12many of them were happy
11:14when this state of Yugoslavia collapsed
11:19because they were not happy
11:21in that semi-democratic regime,
11:23terror, repression.
11:26People were thinking that the war is over.
11:29But it was, of course, it wasn't.
11:32The catastrophe, the tragedy, then started.
11:39Pavlic returned from his exile in Italy
11:42and declared an independent Croat state.
11:44Backed by fascist Italy and Nazi Germany,
11:51Pavlic's new state consisted not only of traditionally Croat lands,
11:55but the whole of Bosnia.
11:58A substantial Serb minority
11:59now found itself living under Ustasha rule.
12:02Martial law was introduced the second day.
12:07Racial laws only after 15 days.
12:12First, anti-Serbian measures also in the first days.
12:17Mass killings took place already at the beginning of May.
12:22That means 20 days after the creation of the government.
12:25They were very, very, very fast.
12:34But there was one major difference
12:36between Pavlic's brand of fascism
12:38and that of the Nazis.
12:44Whereas the Nazis largely despised religion,
12:48Pavlic's regime was staunchly Roman Catholic.
12:50And Pavlic wanted to create an exclusively Catholic state
12:57and cleanse his native land of all alien elements.
13:01They had this strategy of all the thirds.
13:05That means one third of the Serbs should be killed,
13:08one third of the Serbs should be sent to Serbia,
13:12and one third should become Catholics.
13:15And if they become Catholics, then they become Croats.
13:18And that's how he thought that he will resolve
13:22the so-called solution of the Serbian question.
13:35In one of the blacker moments
13:37of the Catholic Church's 20th century history,
13:40the country's leading cleric, Archbishop Stepanic,
13:43gave the regime his blessing.
13:45Much of the Catholic Church became an active partner
13:50in the forced conversion
13:51of the traditionally Christian Orthodox Serbs
13:53to Catholicism.
13:55Croat fascism and the Catholic Church
14:08would remain uncomfortably entwined
14:11for the rest of the war.
14:13The position of the Catholic Church
14:15in the Second World War
14:17is, of course, full of controversies.
14:20When the first Ustasha crimes happened
14:26and they saw what was going on,
14:29the Church was never united in the attitude.
14:35Some of them cooperated with the Ustasha
14:39and some of them even committed crimes.
14:47Pavlic now unleashed a reign of terror
14:49on the Serb minority living within Croatia.
14:53Tens of thousands of them were expelled,
14:56killed or imprisoned.
14:57Antifascist Croats were also jailed.
15:09Bowing to German wishes,
15:10the Ustasha targeted gypsies
15:12and Jews as well.
15:15Their persecution of the Jews
15:16became an excuse for organised theft
15:18on a massive scale.
15:20As they were rounded up,
15:23Jews were stripped of all their possessions,
15:26down to the wedding rings
15:27on their fingers.
15:30By July 1941,
15:32the country's prisons
15:33could no longer cope
15:34with the flood of new inmates.
15:41That summer,
15:42the Ustasha embarked
15:43on the construction
15:44of what would become
15:44some of the biggest
15:45and most horrific
15:46concentration camps in Europe.
15:50Dinko Sakic,
15:52now 21,
15:54seized his moment
15:55to join the cause
15:56and signed up
15:57to be a camp guard.
15:59Over the next few years,
16:01he would rise through the ranks
16:02to become what many allege
16:04was one of the most brutal,
16:05if little known,
16:07Nazi collaborators
16:08of World War II.
16:16Sakic's first job
16:17was at Yersenovac,
16:18just an hour's drive
16:20from the capital, Zagreb.
16:23At Yersenovac,
16:23a number of separate camps
16:25were built on the banks
16:25of the Sava River.
16:28The complex housed
16:29the largest number
16:30of prison inmates
16:31in the whole of Croatia.
16:37Today,
16:37at the Yersenovac site,
16:39memorials and sculptures
16:40stand as a reminder
16:41of those that suffered
16:42and died here.
16:43The mastermind behind the camp
16:51was Max Luburic,
16:53head of Pavlic's
16:54newly formed
16:55special police force
16:56and overall commander
16:57of the Ustasha's
16:59concentration camp program.
17:00In 1943,
17:07Dinko Sakic married
17:08Max Luburic's
17:09half-sister Nada,
17:10a guard at one
17:11of the women's camps
17:12at Yersenovac.
17:13It was a move
17:14that secured a place
17:15in Luburic's inner circle.
17:20Then,
17:20at the age of 24,
17:22Sakic was appointed
17:23camp commandant.
17:25Luburic was
17:26a very important person
17:27and he, of course,
17:29wanted to have
17:30in Yersenovac
17:30a person
17:32who is 100% loyal
17:33to him
17:34and Dinko Sakic
17:35definitely was
17:36the person
17:37of that kind.
17:40He would be much more
17:41than a mere administrator.
17:43His main concern
17:44would soon turn
17:44to extermination.
17:51Luburic began
17:52to draw up plans
17:53for Yersenovac
17:53after visiting
17:54Nazi concentration camps.
17:57Yersenovac
17:59and other camps
17:59in Croatia
18:00were modelled
18:01on the design
18:01and style
18:02of the German ones.
18:06Luburic had also
18:06observed the Nazis'
18:07latest experiments
18:08in mass murder,
18:10gas chambers,
18:11in which men,
18:13women and children
18:14were suffocated
18:15with carbon monoxide
18:16from motor vehicles.
18:20But the guards
18:21at Yersenovac
18:22preferred altogether
18:23simpler methods
18:24of killing.
18:27the Yersenovac
18:36memorial museum
18:36in Croatia
18:37shows some
18:38of the gruesome
18:39artifacts
18:39from the original site.
18:49The displays include
18:51the Ustasha guard's
18:52weapons of choice.
18:53one fearsome implement
18:55was a special blade
18:57known as the Serb cutter.
19:00It was devised
19:01to slit people's throats
19:02quickly and easily.
19:06One guard later
19:07boasted that he had
19:08slit the throats
19:09of some 1,300 prisoners
19:10with his Serb cutter.
19:12inmates were also thrown
19:28into the ovens
19:28of a brick factory
19:29inside one of the camps
19:31at Yersenovac
19:31and burnt alive.
19:33Very few of those
19:45who survived Yersenovac
19:46are still alive
19:48to tell of their experiences.
19:52Pawe Molnar
19:54was 20 years old
19:55when the Germans invaded
19:56and the independent
19:58state of Croatia
19:58was established.
20:00She was an active member
20:01of Zagreb's
20:02communist youth movement.
20:03and was quickly
20:04arrested
20:05and sent
20:06to Yersenovac.
20:09Srpkinje,
20:09Hrvatsk,
20:10and Zidovke
20:10went to Kulu.
20:13In Kulu
20:14there was
20:15the most popular
20:15water
20:16or the water
20:17or the water
20:18or the cupus.
20:22It was
20:22threatened
20:23to death.
20:26These
20:27are certainly
20:28not
20:29seen.
20:30They are
20:30like
20:30big
20:31stones.
20:32They were just walking by people,
20:34they were broken by their eyes,
20:36while they were just not able to defend themselves.
20:42I saw a car with a lopat,
20:44and the women went up to the car,
20:48and they looked and looked and looked and said,
20:50where are our things?
20:51And they said, they will come to you.
20:54On the other day, we didn't see them.
20:57In addition to that, they had to die.
21:02Where did they die? They were killed.
21:27Although it hardly seems possible,
21:32the killing techniques employed by the Ustasa in Croatia
21:35were even more sadistic.
21:45The regime at Jasenovac was so violent and brutal,
21:49it disturbed even the Nazis.
21:52Heimlich Himmler, head of the German SS,
21:59regularly received reports from German eyewitnesses in Croatia.
22:05One of them recorded in 1942.
22:08The Ustasa committed their deeds in a bestial manner,
22:11not only against males of conscript age,
22:14but especially against helpless old people,
22:17women and children.
22:19The number of the Orthodox that the Croats have massacred
22:22and sadistically tortured to death
22:24is about 300,000.
22:29I saw women from Kostajnice,
22:33and we had to look at them,
22:36because Ustasa stands and looks,
22:38and we tell them,
22:40we are the same as you,
22:41tell what you have.
22:43We are the same as you are.
22:45Of course, if someone had a shawl or a gum,
22:46I don't know,
22:48what is this.
22:49Ustasa went to us,
22:51he looked at them,
22:53and they got upset,
22:54and they got upset,
22:56and they started throwing money,
22:58and they sold a lot,
23:00and they sold a lot of 10.
23:02And they sold a lot of them,
23:03and they sold everything.
23:04And they sold it.
23:05That's what we saw.
23:06Eventually the Ustasha became worried about the stories of torture and mass
23:13murder at Yusenovac. To put an end to the gossip, the Pavlic regime commissioned a
23:22series of photographs. They showed inmates in the camp doing useful work for the war
23:29effort. But beyond the reach of the camera lens, the cruelty and mass murder
23:39continued without let-up.
23:59It wasn't in Kuli, it wasn't in Kuli, it wasn't in Kuli, it wasn't in Kuli, it wasn't in Kuli.
24:06I think that the whole village of the children were thrown out of it.
24:14That's what you can't forgive. It's really scary.
24:19There were children at the end of the town. Some of our Hrvatians had a little
24:31record for them. Of course, they were all dead from the prolif, from the tifus, from the
24:35blood, and all died.
24:49But even as the brutality at Yusenovac continued,
25:18underground resistance movements began to spring up throughout Yugoslavia.
25:26By the end of 1942, the Pavlic regime, together with its German and Italian allies,
25:32had its hands full, fighting the growing number of partisans resisting fascist occupation.
25:41Led by Croat communist leader Joseph Broz Tito,
25:44and supplied and trained by the British and the Americans,
25:47this guerrilla army now presented a mortal threat to the Pavlic regime.
25:54Tito's partisans came into the middle of the conflict
25:57offering something what they called brotherhood and unity.
26:02We want to win the war against the Nazis, fascists and collaborators.
26:08We are offering a solution.
26:20The war against the partisans was fought without pity.
26:26Hundreds of thousands of civilians as well as partisans were killed.
26:29However, the guerrilla army managed to hold out.
26:39And time was running out for Dinko Sakic and his fellow Ustasha killers
26:43at the Yusenovac concentration camp.
27:00In the autumn of 1944, the Russian army continued its westward drive into Europe
27:04by advancing deep into the Balkans.
27:08By October, Soviet troops had linked up with Tito's partisans,
27:13and together they liberated the Yugoslav capital, Belgrade.
27:16The Croatian puppet state was now under serious threat.
27:30Dinko Sakic was ordered to kill all the survivors at Yusenovac
27:34and obliterate the evidence.
27:38Sakic ordered his men to carry out what became known as the Autumn Liquidation.
27:42For 20 days, they selected the sick and the old among the prisoners,
27:55and executed them.
28:01Afterwards, they threw their bodies into the Sava River.
28:12In April 1945, Tito's partisans arrived at Yusenovac.
28:25They found nothing but ruins, rotting bodies,
28:29and huge piles of clothing stolen from the dead.
28:32Investigations began into just how many people had died at Yusenovac,
28:51at the hands of Dinko Sakic and his Ustasha comrades in the previous four years.
28:56But in the absence of documents which had all been destroyed,
29:02no reliable figure was ever produced.
29:07Historians now believe that an estimated one million Yugoslav citizens
29:13perished between 1941 and 1945.
29:16It's thought that one third of these, over 300,000, died at Yusenovac.
29:25In May 1945, the Germans surrendered to the victorious Allies,
29:26and the independent state of Croatia collapsed like a pack of cards.
29:28In May 1945, the Germans surrendered to the victorious Allies,
29:30and the independent state of Croatia collapsed like a pack of cards.
29:31Thousands of Ustasa members fled alongside German troops
29:39In May 1945, the Germans surrendered to the victorious Allies,
29:50and the independent state of Croatia collapsed like a pack of cards.
29:57Thousands of Ustasha members fled alongside German troops
30:00and found refuge in prison camps run by the British in neighbouring Italy and Austria.
30:05The British were ignorant of Croatian involvement in Nazi crimes,
30:11so they made little effort to look for Pavlic and his closest Ustasha comrades.
30:17Dinko Sakic was one of those who evaded the round-up.
30:21Some now believe that his escape was aided by members of the Roman Catholic Church.
30:25It's thought they received help from a senior member of the Catholic Church,
30:37closely linked to the Vatican.
30:43With money and false papers supplied by this Catholic rat line,
30:47they were able to seek a new life abroad,
30:49with South America as one of the most popular destinations.
30:55Zagreb, 1946.
31:04The Catholic Church found itself on trial for its support of the Ustasha regime.
31:11Unable to catch any of the key players, such as Pavlic, Luburic or Sakic,
31:16the communist government of Joseph Tito put Archbishop Stepanich in the dock.
31:21He was tried for collaboration with the Ustasha
31:26and for permitting the forcible conversion of Serbs from Orthodox Christianity to Catholicism.
31:39Stepanich was found guilty of treason and war crimes.
31:43It was a verdict that usually meant the death penalty,
31:45but Stepanich got off with just 16 years.
31:52Amazingly, after just five years behind bars, he was released.
31:57Then in 1998, in a move that polarised public opinion, not only in Croatia, but in the wider world,
32:07Pope John Paul II declared Archbishop Stepanich a martyr,
32:11and he was beatified, a major step towards becoming a saint.
32:16And at the same time, there was more bad news for the Catholic Church.
32:25A secret document released by the U.S. Treasury Department
32:28revealed that for the previous 50 years,
32:31the Vatican had held on to some 200 million Swiss francs,
32:35plundered from Serbs and Jews by the Ustasha.
32:38Meanwhile, Dinko Sackage was enjoying the hospitality of Argentina's president,
32:56Colonel Juan Perón.
32:58Perón was a charismatic leader who admired right-wing European dictators
33:02and even styled himself on them.
33:04He regarded men like Sackage and Pavelich as heroes in the struggle against godless communism
33:09and welcomed them with open arms.
33:17Benefiting from Argentine government protection,
33:20Sackage and his wife Nada settled down in the South Atlantic coastal resort of Santa Teresita,
33:25just outside Buenos Aires, and there raised a family.
33:28Sackage lived quietly in Argentina under the name Lubomir Sackage-Belanovich
33:35and set up a textile factory.
33:42He remained active in Ustasha émigré politics,
33:46and so did his former wartime chief, and Pavelich.
33:49Then in 1958, Pavelich made a rare appearance on television,
33:58justifying his past as Croatia's wartime fascist dictator.
34:02A year later, Pavelich was murdered,
34:25the victim of an assassin working for Tito's secret police.
34:28But Dinko Sackage stayed safely in the shadows.
34:34Then, after almost half a century's exile in Argentina,
34:39the past began to catch up with him.
34:41In 1990, Croatian independence raised its head yet again.
35:00Ten years earlier, President Tito had died,
35:05and although he'd managed to keep his beloved Yugoslavia together,
35:09now it was about to break apart.
35:14Croats voiced their desire for independence once more.
35:19Their newly elected leader, Franjo Tudzman,
35:21had always been a loyal supporter of Tito.
35:24But as Yugoslavia began to implode,
35:27Tudzman took up the cause of Croatian nationalism.
35:30This was the queue for civil war to break out.
35:39The Serbs, who had not forgotten the crimes committed by the Ustaše against them,
35:59went to war against the Croats.
36:04And so began a new war in the Balkans,
36:08a war that would last for most of the 1990s
36:11and would involve all of the peoples of the former Yugoslavia.
36:23As hundreds of thousands of people were massacred or forced to flee from their homes,
36:27a new phrase entered modern political vocabulary.
36:30Ethnic cleansing.
36:34But for men like Dinko Sakić, ethnic cleansing was nothing new.
36:38That had been their task at Yersenovac.
36:42With renewed interest in Croatia's violent history,
36:54journalists in Argentina and abroad began to seek out Dinko Sakić to hear his views.
37:01In 1998, 50 years after fleeing Croatia with his wife Nader,
37:07Dinko Sakić made a serious error of judgment.
37:11One day, a reporter from Argentinian TV program Telenoche knocked on his door requesting an interview.
37:22Sakić agreed and invited him in.
37:26Hardly able to believe his luck,
37:28the TV reporter wanted to gain Sakić's trust,
37:31so his first question was intended to make Sakić feel at ease.
37:35When you came to Europe,
37:38I came to Argentina on December 22nd of 1947,
37:44in the morning.
37:46And in what circumstances?
37:47How did you come to Europe?
37:48How did you come to Europe?
37:49How did you come to Europe?
37:50Because we passed a group of croatans,
37:54like 500 croatans,
37:56came with a multiple visa,
38:00which the Argentinian government gave in the first time,
38:04the US government gave in the first time,
38:06which was the first time,
38:07which was the first time,
38:08which was the first time,
38:09which was the first time,
38:11which was the first time.
38:12We had a document,
38:13which was the first time,
38:14which was the first time.
38:15We had a document.
38:16I had already obtained the visa for immigration,
38:17and we came with 150,
38:19a group of 150,
38:21with the tucumán.
38:23The TV reporter now began to probe
38:25a little deeper into Sakić's past.
38:28I am a Croatans who fought for my people.
38:33And that's how I started.
38:35That's how I started.
38:36So I was a man of trust.
38:40You were also in Hacenovac?
38:43How?
38:44You were also in Hacenovac?
38:46How?
38:47You were also in Hacenovac?
38:50I was a former kind of aнут yesenovac remember.
38:52I was more than a unit later.
39:02Dinko Sakic was uncomfortable owning up
39:04to being at Hacenovac,
39:06but the television reporter persisted.
39:09Usted fue comandante del campo al final.
39:12No, fue director, no comandante.
39:15Fue nombrado, fue 100 dÃas nomás.
39:18Mire, durante donde, cuando yo estaba,
39:22no habÃa ningún guardia ni ningún administrativo
39:26que podrÃa tocarle a un prisionero, de cualquier, sea judÃo.
39:33Recuérdeme las fechas.
39:34Esto fue entre el 41 y el 44.
39:38En 42, en diciembre de 42 y octubre de 44.
39:46¿En esa época no se podÃa tocar a los prisioneros?
39:49Yo, mire, no hablo lo que era antes ni lo que era después.
39:54Pero mientras yo estaba, nadie podÃa tocar.
39:59Nadie podÃa tocar a nadie.
40:01Ellos tenÃan sus normas internas
40:04y si alguno ha hecho algo,
40:10entonces la administración interna lo castigaba con lo que sea.
40:17¿Y entre fines del 42 y fines del 44 no se mató a nadie?
40:21Yo no vi ni se mató.
40:23Que nosotros no tenÃamos interés en matar a la gente.
40:28TenÃamos necesitábamos a gente para trabajar,
40:31para abastecernos.
40:34Cuando la entrevista de telenoche fue revelada en argentino televisión,
40:42it creó una sensación.
40:46Dinko Sackage had finally stepped out of the shadows
40:48into the full glare of publicity.
40:50And the consequences for him would be disastrous.
40:58Efraim Zurov,
40:59one of the most senior Nazi hunters
41:01at the Simon Wiesenthal Center,
41:03got to hear about Sackage's TV appearance.
41:06He immediately set about securing his extradition
41:09to stand trial.
41:10In the Croatian capital of Zagreb,
41:15the reaction to Sackage's public reappearance
41:17placed President Tudzman in a dilemma.
41:21Tudzman saw himself as a Croatian patriot,
41:24proud of his country's wartime history.
41:26He had used it to help rebuild his country.
41:29He had even argued that the death toll at Yesenovac
41:32had been inflated.
41:37According to Tudzman's version of history,
41:39Sackage was a freedom fighter
41:41and an honourable Croat patriot.
41:46But in the mid-1990s,
41:48Tudzman needed to demonstrate to the world,
41:50especially to the United States,
41:52that Croatia was a modern, pro-Western democracy.
41:57Americans in particular regarded Sackage
41:59as a Nazi collaborator and sadistic killer,
42:03one of the last living commandants
42:05of a World War II death camp.
42:07Asesinos!
42:08Asesinos!
42:09Asesinos!
42:10Cárceles!
42:11Cárceles a los asesinos!
42:15Within weeks of the Telenochi interview,
42:18Dinko Sackage was arrested.
42:20The media descended on the quiet neighbourhood.
42:22What was he said?
42:23No, no, no.
42:24I didn't speak to him.
42:26I didn't speak to him.
42:27I didn't speak to him.
42:28I didn't speak to him.
42:28I didn't speak to him.
42:28I didn't speak to him.
42:36In similar cases,
42:37the Argentinian authorities
42:38had reacted very slowly
42:40to calls from abroad
42:41for the arrest
42:42and repatriation
42:43of old Nazi war criminals.
42:45But this time,
42:47the response was different.
42:49Are you a killer, Mr. Sackage?
42:50I'm a dummy.
42:51Dinko!
42:52Dinko!
42:54Dinko Sackage
42:55was soon on his way back to Croatia
42:57to face justice at last.
43:00I think that it's fair to say
43:01that this could be
43:02an important milestone
43:03for Croatian society.
43:05This trial will be a litmus test
43:07for the new Croatia,
43:09for the country
43:09which seeks to fully integrate itself
43:11into the West.
43:12We should be thinking
43:13of the victims
43:14of the Ustasha regime,
43:16anti-fascist croats,
43:18Serbs, Jews and gypsies.
43:20They are the ones
43:21who deserve our sympathy
43:22and our empathy.
43:26On June 18, 1998,
43:29Dinko Sackage arrived
43:30back in Croatia
43:31for the first time
43:32since the end of World War II.
43:37His wife, Nada,
43:38came with him.
43:40She, too,
43:40had served at Yersenovac.
43:42specifically in the women's camp.
43:45She was therefore
43:45implicated in war crimes
43:47and now faced interrogation
43:48by the authorities.
43:51She was deeply involved
43:54in that manner
43:56that she knew
43:57what was going on,
43:59that she saw people
44:01who were persecuted
44:03and killed.
44:04and she cannot say
44:06that it didn't happen.
44:12Dinko Sackage's trial
44:13finally opened
44:14in November 1998
44:15at the Zagreb
44:17District Court.
44:19He was charged
44:20with the deaths
44:20of thousands of prisoners
44:21while he had been
44:22the commandant
44:23at Yersenovac.
44:24more than 30 witnesses
44:28including camp survivors
44:30testified against him.
44:34However,
44:34throughout the trial,
44:36Sackage maintained
44:36his innocence.
44:39The professor
44:39of Croatian contemporary history
44:41at Zagreb University,
44:43Dr. Ivo Goldstein,
44:44was called
44:45as an expert witness.
44:46When I was speaking,
44:48he was laughing
44:49when I was speaking
44:50about the Ustasha
44:51system of terror.
44:52But he was laughing
44:53when some other witnesses
44:55were speaking as well.
44:57So it was not
44:58nothing new.
45:02The judge was warning him
45:04a couple of times,
45:05Mr. Sackage,
45:06don't laugh,
45:07don't laugh,
45:08it's not funny,
45:08don't laugh.
45:09And he was laughing again
45:10and again and again.
45:13Sackage was eventually
45:14found guilty of killing
45:15or condoning the killing
45:17of more than 2,000 Serbs,
45:19Jews and gypsies.
45:23He was sentenced
45:24to 20 years imprisonment,
45:26the maximum penalty
45:27available at the time.
45:29The trial judge said
45:31his lack of remorse
45:32contributed to the length
45:33of the sentence.
45:38Although interrogated,
45:40Nara Sackage
45:40never stood trial.
45:43For most people,
45:44Croatia had finally faced up
45:46to its fascist past.
45:52In July 2008,
45:54Dinko Sackage died
45:55in a prison hospital,
45:56aged 86.
46:01He was no Heinrich Himmler
46:03or even Ant Pavlic.
46:05He was just a small cog
46:07in a big machine.
46:08A machine that had given him
46:10the power of life and death
46:11over thousands of human beings.
46:16To the very end of his life,
46:18he felt he had no need
46:19to apologize to anybody
46:21for his actions.
46:24The crimes of Dinko Sackage
46:26and his Ustasha comrades
46:28were committed
46:29in the name of the people
46:30of Croatia.
46:31Even today,
46:36there are many of his countrymen
46:37and women who believe
46:38that Sackage was no war criminal,
46:40but a heroic fighter
46:42in the cause of freedom
46:43for their nation.
46:45They believe that his victims,
46:48the Serbs,
46:49Jews,
46:50communists and gypsies,
46:52were the real criminals,
46:53not Dinko Sackage.
46:55In their eyes,
46:59Sackage's collaboration
47:00with the Nazis
47:01was in defense of their nation
47:03and the holy Catholic faith.
47:08Dinko Sackage's remains
47:09are held here
47:10in the main cemetery
47:11in central Zagreb.
47:15At his funeral,
47:17the Roman Catholic priest
47:18told the mourners
47:19that he was proud
47:20he had seen Sackage
47:21in his coffin
47:22dressed in an Ustasha uniform.
47:25He added,
47:27every honorable Croat
47:28is proud of the name
47:30Dinko Sackage.
47:38But not every Croat
47:39agrees.
47:40For many,
47:41the Ustasha regime
47:42is a brutal
47:43and bloody memory
47:44of the country's history.
47:47A memory
47:48that must never be forgotten.
47:50There were Ustasas
47:51and there were no Ustasha
47:53who would not have done it.
47:55and he said,
47:56he doesn't say anything
47:56or he doesn't say anything.
47:57He doesn't say anything.
47:58and he doesn't say anything.
47:59He doesn't say anything.
48:00He doesn't say anything.
48:01He doesn't say anything.
48:02I don't say anything.
48:03He doesn't say anything.
48:04So I'm talking about this as a evil that has been,
48:09and that it can't be done anymore.
48:11I believe that it can't be done anymore.
48:21And those who don't have it, we still live with those who don't.
48:34And those who don't have it, we still live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with those who don't live with.
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