Eduardo Rózsa-Flores

Eduardo Rózsa-Flores (31 March 1960 — 16 April 2009) was a Bolivian-Hungarian mercenary, journalist, actor, and secret agent. Born in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia, he was known in Hungary as Rózsa-Flores Eduardo or Rózsa György Eduardo. His wartime nickname in the Croatian War of Independence was Chico, which is also the title of a feature film about him.

Family, early life, studies

Eduardo Rózsa-Flores was born in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia. His father, György Obermayer Rózsa, was a Hungarian painter, of Jewish descent, who left Hungary in 1948, moving first to Paris, and, in 1952, to Bolivia with a French ethnographic mission, adopting the forename Jorge. He stayed on, lecturing art, and married Nelly Flores Arias,a Catalan immigrant and high school teacher.

A committed communist, Jorge Rózsa moved the family to Chile to escape the Hugo Banzer dictatorship in 1972, but emigrated to Sweden in 1973 after Augusto Pinochet came to power. In 1974, they moved to Hungary.^{[citation needed]}

Rózsa-Flores attended secondary school in Budapest. After military service he went for a short period of intelligence training, at the Felix Dzerzhinsky KGB Academy in the Soviet Union. He later joined Hungarian intelligence services. He attended Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), earning his degree in 1991. He was the last Secretary of the Communist Youth Organization at ELTE in 1990. He allegedly had cooperated with the Hungarian secret services as a student. His first journalism work was with the Cuban news agency Prensa Latina. In the late 1980s he reportedly joined Opus Dei.

War

At the start of the Croatian War of Independence, Rózsa-Flores – known then as Jorge Eduardo Rózsa – worked as a correspondent for the Barcelona newspaper La Vanguardia and the Spanish unit of the BBC World Service. He arrived in Yugoslavia in June 1991. While reporting on and witnessing the civil war there, his car was shot at. After that he joined the Croatian National Guard in Osijek as its first foreign volunteer. During the next few years, he took part in several battles in the Slavonia area of eastern Croatia, including defending Laslovo, where he set up the Croatian army's First International Unit. He later served as a commander of the special forces. Croatian president Franjo Tuđman personally granted him Croatian citizenship in appreciation of his services. He was wounded three times in battle, and obtained the rank of colonel in 1993. Unconfirmed press reports have linked him to the deaths of two foreign journalists also in Croatia at the time, Swiss national Christian Würtenberg (who was in the First International Unit), and British photographer Paul Jenks. He was officially demobilized on 31 July 1994.

Death

On 16 April 2009, Bolivian police killed Rózsa-Flores during a raid in the Las Americas hotel in Santa Cruz. Two other people, Hungarian Árpád Magyarosi, and Irishman Michael Dwyer, died during the action. Two others, Mario Tadic, a Croatian, and Előd Tóásó, a Hungarian – were arrested. Bolivian authorities said that Rózsa-Flores was the leader of a terrorist group which intended to assassinate Bolivian president Evo Morales. In 2011, members of the Police unit that performed the raid were awarded the Medal of Valor.

Last interview

On 21 April 2009 Hungarian Television broadcast an interview recorded in September 2008 by Hungarian journalist András Kepes prior to his last trip to Bolivia, and asked Kepes not to release the interview until either he returned or in the case that something happened to him.

Rózsa-Flores claimed that a Bolivian national requested him to return to Bolivia and help establish a milita for the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz, in response to perceived central government abuses. He claimed that local politicians wanted to establish the militia and that he was asked to create it based upon his Croatian military experience. He claimed the militia role was to be one of self-defense in the event of aggression by either central government or native "Indian" paramilitary forces and not to attack anyone.

Bibliography

• Mocskos háború [The Filthy War] (Magyar Kapu Alapítvány, 1994 ISBN 9630070693)
• Hallgatás hadművelet [Writings from the Yugoslav War 1991-1996] (H-Elen 55 Szolgáltató 1996 ISBN 9630475502)
• Meghaltunk, és mégis élünk [We Died but Still We Live On] (Magyar Kapu Alapitvany 1998)
• Hűség – Vjernost – Lealtad [Loyalty: Verses from War 1991-1996] (Magyar Kapu Alapítvány 1999 ISBN 9637706216)
• Állapot: Két háború között [Condition: Between Two Wars] (Magyar a Magyarért Alapítvány 2001 ISBN 9630070693)
• Disznóságok gyűjteménye [Swine Collection] (Magyar a Magyarért Alapítvány 2003 ISBN 9632069714)
• 69 titok, szerelmes versek és egy magyarázat [69 Secrets, Love Poems and an Explanation] (2004)
• 47 szúfi vers [47 Sufi Verses] (2007)

Films

• Bolse Vita (1996), role
• Vizualizáció (1997), main role
• Kisváros (1997), Karvaly
• Chico (2001), lead role

External links

• Biography on index.hu (Hungarian)/
• hu.netlog.com/rozsafloreseduardo ERF Blog
• eduardorozsaflores.blogspot.com ERF Blog
• Hungarian Spectrum blog thread on Rozsa-Flores
• website of Eduardo Rózsa-Flores
• Travels with my camera, documentary film
• Bolivian Ex-General who Captured Che Guevara Summoned for Questioning