Zagreb
Everything is easy and a nice little cheap hotel in found and in the morning we are on the road again once Daniel finally wakes up. His alarm broke and we are now up against the clock to make it to Zagreb in time.
The Zagreb action is a media conference and petition signing. As a target country it’s not that important as they have committed to signing in Oslo in December. What is important is to keep the issue alive in the minds of the Croatians. We have some fantastic campaigners here who are full of energy and the most determined of all is our old friend Djiana. She is the widow of the former Prime Minister and has driven this process single handed through the Croat bureaucracy. It’s been a tough haul for her too as she has taken many a political hit from those who wanted to get to her husband.
In 2006 Croatia hosted the Meeting of States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty. She came under heavy political fire for a photo that I took of a disabled volleyball match. The match was an international between disabled veterans from the war. All were there, Bosnian, Serb and Croat. Some nationalist idiot stole the photo of Serbs and Croats playing their match. Next it was on TV with a little fat idiot ranting and raving. Djiana got the flak for that and my regret was that I had flown to London that day and wasn’t there to take it personally. I welcome a fight like that and can savage their position easily but it won’t be pretty. A person like Djiana can’t launch such a brutal attack as she is in the public eye and must maintain decorum. The really ridiculous part of this is that the players were all old soldiers who have lost parts of their bodies to these ugly weapons. If they can put the past behind them and meet in the sports arena and enjoy a beer together, why can’t these little fat men in capital cities who wrap themselves in flags and sing national anthems louder than anyone else. All they are is pond life, like some form of foetal amoeba with nothing better to fill their lives with than hatred. No country goes forward when people like this determine the future.
We blast along the motorway watching the clock and enter the city. “Look how they look at us,” says Davor.
He was right, driving into Zagreb with a Serb registered vehicle was like Paul Robeson at a Clan meeting, none too comfortable. The stares continued till we found the central square and after and few bad turn made it into the middle of it. Our local campaigners were really happy to see us and we all got busy sorting out the Ban Bus signage again. I was very conscious of the past problems and set about covering the registration plates with Ban Bus signage and photographs. This needed to be just a car and not a car from the moon or worse.
We had it fully decorated and covered then one gap in the system crept in. A young journalist read a sign on the hood and it said “Stop Killing Civilians”. The word stop was spelt in Serbian and not in Croatian. Only a letter or two different and the bend could go from focus on the treaty to another Croat Serb beat up. The offending sign was quickly removed and hurled into the back of the van before it could become a catalyst for ugly nationalism.
The media attendance was good and we were given extra support with an Ambassador, some embassy officials and the ex Croat Ambassador to Denmark all coming along. They signed the People’s Treaty then the Mayor of Zagreb arrived. This proved a media coup as he played with a blind woman’s dog and also signed. I felt we had survived the event and as we headed off to the university to talk about the problem and the future. There was only a handful of people, along with Djiana and Mina. Mina was injured by the cluster strike on Zagreb in 1995. The war was drawing to an end and she was at the bank when out of nowhere the world began to explode. The Serbs were firing cluster bombs into the city centre. People were killed around her and she very nearly lost her leg as well as her life.
As the group at the university was small it turned into a workshop. Everybody was 100% behind the creation of the treaty and looking for ways that they could connect and engage. The big point is to keep the government to their word and make sure that they don’t just sign but ratify and implement the treaty as well.
We talked about the hostile happenings of 2006 and this made Mina quite angry. “They have to get over it,” she said. “The war was bad for everyone, Croat, Serb and Bosnian. If we don’t leave it behind we stay locked in the past. If anyone has a right to complain it is me and all I want is for us all to move on.” Truer words could not be spoken.
We were on the road again and this time we are right out of the Balkans and on the road to Italy.
The Ban Bus is an advocacy initiative. We are now striving to achieve a ban on cluster bombs. Our immediate mission is to work towards stronger legislation in Australia.