Arkan

Željko Ražnatović (in Serbian Cyrillic writing: Жељко Ражнатовић), widely known as Arkan, (April 17, 1952 - January 15, 2000), was a Serbian paramilitary leader during Yugoslav Wars, and also folk hero, nationalist politician, assembly representative, war profiteer, supreme mafia boss, black market businessman, private entrepreneur, owner of a soccer club and caterer. Prior to that he had been a juvenile delinquent, street rowdy, fanatical nemesis, wandering adventurer, bank robber, mobster, secret police agent, hitman, gambler, soccer fans leader, and ice-cream man.

Beginning

Ražnatović was born in Brežice, a small town in Styrian region of southern Slovenia. His father Veljko was a Montenegrin, serving as a high ranking officer in the Yugoslavian air force. Family Ražnatović is one of the most prominent tribes and fraternities in Montenegro. Arkan had lived with three older sisters and his mother Slavka. His parents divorced in his youth. Arkan's father often beat him when he was young, and treated his family harshly as with his army subordinates. As a child Arkan often ran away from home to cause mischief, eventually ending up in a delinquents' institution. He was a petty criminal already in his early teenage years, before graduating to more serious offences as an adult.

In 1972, at the age of twenty, he illegally departed to Western Europe, hoping to find respect and fortune through a criminal career. Abroad he met many well-known criminals from Yugoslavia who were later killed. He took his nickname Arkan after a comic strip character. However, the word arcanus in Latin means 'mysterious'. As an armed robber, assailant and murderer he had convictions or warrants in Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy. He was imprisoned in Belgium in 1974, escaped in 1977, rearrested in the Netherlands in 1979 but escaped again in 1981. He was wounded in a clash with the police. He fled from dozens of European prisons, including the compound which today is a high security prison for war criminals in the Scheveningen suburb of the Hague. Ražnatović was on Interpol's red list of ten most wanted men.

In his youth Arkan was a ward of the Slovenian politician Stane Dolanc, his father's friend. Dolanc was chief of the secret police and a close associate of the Yugoslav strongman Josip Broz Tito. Whenever Arkan was in trouble Dolanc helped him as a reward for his services to the Yugoslav secret state police (UDBA). Arkan worked as an undercover agent from 1973, whose job was to carry out assassinations of various terrorists, political emigrants and opponents of the ruling Communist regime.

Arkan was forced to learn main European languages during his secret assignments by government in Europe. He spoke fluently English, French and Italian, and communicated in German, Swedish and Dutch.

He returned to Serbia in 1981 after nine years of turbulent life spent in Western Europe. He continued his criminal career, also opening a number of illegal businesses. In November 1983, two federal policemen ambushed Arkan at his house in order to have him arrested and interrogated over some of his activities. He resisted, pulled out his gun and shot and wounded both of them. An intervention from Stane Dolanc effected his release from prison only two days later. Dolanc, who once said: "Arkan is worth more than entire service" personally collected Arkan on his release from prison. This incident increased Arkan's criminal reputation in Belgrade.

Role in Yugoslav wars

As the political, ethnic and religious situation in the former Yugoslavia in the early nineties became tense, on October 11 1990 he created a paramilitary group named the Serb Volunteer Guard under the auspices of the Yugoslav Peoples Army (JNA) general staff. Arkan was chosen as commander of newly founded voluntary unit. This was, ostensibly, an organization of Red Star Belgrade (Crvena Zvezda) soccer club supporters.

In November of 1990, Arkan traveled to Knin for a meeting of the council of war of the Krajina uprising. On the way back to Belgrade after the meeting he was arrested for gun-running by Croatian police at the border crossing between Croatia and Bosnia Dvor na Uni with five other Serbians on November 29, 1990. His group was charged with conspiracy to overthrow newly formed Croatian state and suspected of attempted assassination of then newly elected Croatian president Franjo Tuđman. He was released from prison on June 14, 1991 under unclear circumstances, after a sensational political trial in Zagreb, the Croatian capital. Some former state officials later claimed that his release was set up by a secret agreement between the Serbian and Croatian leaderships.

Arkan's Tigers, a paramilitary force he created, set up their headquarters and training camp in a former military facility in Erdut. His volunteer army saw action from mid 1991 to late 1995, initially in region of eastern Slavonia. It is reported that his irregular army consisted of 10,000 well-trained fighters equipped with modern weapons, including a few tanks and helicopters. Casualties of his militia were estimated to one thousand men. His units were supplied and equipped by reserves of Serbian police force during the war in Croatia and Bosnia.

When war began in Bosnia in April 1992, he and his units first moved to Bijeljina, Zvornik and Brčko. They were engaged in combat against armed Bosniaks culminating in the infamous Siege of Sarajevo. His forces were linked with the Vukovar hospital slaughter, Srebrenica massacre and other acts of Ethnic cleansing. In autumn 1995 his troops fought in the area of Banja Luka, Sanski Most and Prijedor where they were routed. Arkan personally lead most of war actions. He is also said to have been associated with looting, plunder and smuggling operations. Arkan rewarded his bravest soldiers. Whilst his units were known to be highly disciplined, they nevertheless committed acts of unseen brutality against non-Serbian population in Bosnia. "Tigers" were known for executing any captured prisoners.

Arkan was feared and hated from neighboring nations as a butcher and maniac. He was regarded from Western nations as terrorist and extremist and was proclaimed a notorious Warlord for committing alleged atrocities against civilians. Arkan was considered a dangerous man by many despite his baby face look. He was known for his rough behavior toward his soldiers during wartime. Arkan worked under surveillance of Radovan Karadžić and Biljana Plavšić in Bosnia. In the Serb rebel republic of Krajina his troops were stationed there to fight against the Croatian army, and he had a harsh quarrel over military operations with regional leader of Serbs Milan Martić. Arkan was an confidante of Zoran Đinđić and occasionally met with him during war. During the NATO bombing campaign, Arkan warned Đinđić to leave the country because his life was in danger from Milosevic's secret police. Arkan also had friendly contacts and political plans with Russian ultra-nationalist politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky.

Power and fame in Serbia and Montenegro

Arkan was a very controversial person and a powerful man with high-level connections in the state apparatus. Arkan even held the place of minister without portfolio for a while. He had significant influence over public spheres of Serbian society. For his public image Arkan presented himself as defender of Serbs and fighter for freedom and justice. Arkan had many characters. He was a strong personality, a man of his word, remarkable, ready for anything, decisive, fearless, righteous, vindictive, smart, capable, skilled, cunning, generous, wicked, cruel, strange, conceited, unforeseeable and nervous. In more private situations, however Arkan sometimes could be charismatic, emotional, compassionate and funny. Arkan provoked jealousy among people primarily because of being demonstrative in public. Arkan also organized and financed humanitarian aid for poor families and war orphans. Arkan also gave monthly payment of alimony to his crippled volunteers and the families of slain soldiers.

He was praised and glorified among one part of ordinary Serbs, enjoyed war fame, there were war songs about him. Others hated and slandered him, mainly because of his extravagant comfort, swaggering life style, and his enormous wealth. There were all kinds of rumors and gossip about his life. He had a voluminous mansion in elite Belgrade settlement of Dedinje where politicians and foreign embassies reside in the Serbian capital. Arkan respected the Serbian Orthodox Church highly, and the Serb Partriarch Pavle. Arkan was pious and frequently celebrated religious holidays.

On November 3, 1993 Arkan with his followers founded Party of Serbian Unity, and was elected its president, but the party lost parliamentary elections and failed to win seats despite an energetic promotiional campaign, because of Arkan's notoriety among the masses, rag-tag organized political program, and the regime steal of votes. Arkan planned to candidate himself in presidential elections scheduled for autumn 2000. The party he founded got 200,000 votes and won 14 seats in the Serbian parliament 11 months after his murder. After Arkan's death his party no longer works under his political concept.

In the postwar period after the Dayton agreement was signed, Arkan returned to sport and private business. The Serb Volunteer Guard was officially disbanded in April 1996 with the threat to be reactivated in case of war emergency. In June that year he took over an second class soccer team "Obilić" which later under his tutorship advanced and became national champion for one season. UEFA under American pressure permitted his team Obilić participation in the European league because of its connections with his alleged war crimes. But Arkan stepped away from the position of president of the club and gave that seat to his wife Ceca, and his club Obilić played matches against FC Bayern München and Atletico de Madrid. Arkan was also a chairman of the Yugoslav kick-boxing association.

Arkan had fathered nine children by five different women and was a great womanizer. Arkan's eldest son Mihajlo was born in 1975 from a relationship with a Swedish woman, Agneta. Mihajlo went to war with his father. Then followed two female children one from relations with a Belgian woman and other with a Belgrade actress. All three with his acknowledged paternity. Arkan's first wife was Natalija Martinović, professor of spanish, with whom he had four children. Arkan later divorced her and married a much younger Svetlana Veličković 'Ceca', a popular and attractive folk singer ("turbofolk"), on February 19, 1995. They functioned as a prestigious and glamorous couple often appearing in public. Their children are son Veljko and daughter Anastasija.

Arkan's "business" was initially based on controlling forcible protection, money extortion, smuggling of oil, luxurious cars and cigarettes. Later he mainly legalized his jobs. Arkan had about four hundred people working for him. He owned a casinos, companies, discos, gas stations, pastry shops, stores, bakeries, restaurants and weight lifting rooms. Arkan was also said to have removed some of his crime rivals.

Arkan was unofficially allied with Slobodan Milošević, and moved under his control, although he was completely independent in front's actions and decisions. Contacts between them were done through mediator Radovan Stojičić "Badža", police chief and Milosevic's close associate who was killed in the restaurant "Mamma Mia" in April 1997. Arkan and Badza together organized the territorial defense of Eastern Slavonia, and were friends. From Stojicic's state funeral exist a famous photograph where Arkan after brief conversation with iron-saddened Milošević stands right behind him and watches him rather discerning. It was used for proving their close relations. But both Milošević and Arkan were very careful to distance from each other in public.

In August 1998, when tensions over Kosovo had already began, Arkan tried to get close to the West. He wrote a letter of support to U.S. president Bill Clinton over the bombings of U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. In the letter he expressed condolences for victims that died in the attack, and warned Clinton on the dangers of Islamic fundamentalism. An excerpt from his letter reads: "Mr President... do not allow that terrorism continues in this part of Balkan in Serbian state, who is for centuries friend of your state." Clinton ignored him and never responded to the letter.

There is a true story of one distant ancestor of Arkan who killed a Turkish pasha by cutting his head off in revenge for the massive slaughter of Serbian dukes by Turks in the 1804 insurrection. That historical event entered all Serbian libraries of resistance and heroism against Turkish tyranny. Arkan's paternal uncle Vojislav was executed as a notable partisan by Italian soldiers in 1944.

Role in Kosovo war

When war broke out in the unstable former Yugoslavian province of Kosovo in the summer of 1998, Arkan ordered his officers and soldiers to join the army and police in the fight against the Albanian rebel army UCK, but he personally did not go there to supervise the front situation. Before the worst unrests began, Arkan visited Kosovo on several occasions as a government official, trying to pacify Albanians and to give a sense of security and hope to local Serbs. He also played an important role in the Kosovo war. His center of operations for Kosovo was in the Priština hotel "Grand" where he also owned a bakery "Kruna". After Serbian forces withdrew, his hotel was confiscated by NATO troops in June 1999.

He was indicted on a secret list for the tribunal's chief judge Richard May by ICTY, branch of Hague Tribunal of international justice on September 30, 1997 for war crimes of genocide, killing civilians, crimes against humanity and grave breaches of the Geneva convention of 1949 for customs and traditions of war. The warrant was kept sealed and was not made public until March 31, 1999, when a joint NATO operation against Yugoslavia had already started week earlier. Arkan's indictment was made public by Louise Arbour, then U.N. court's chief prosecutor. The publication of Arkan's indictment was interpreted as a maneuver aimed at preventing him from deploying his "Tigers" paramilitary unit in the escalating conflict in Kosovo, where Serbs were trying to drive out ethnic Albanians. He decisively denied all war crime charges against him in interviews he gave to CNN, BBC stations and other foreign reporters during bombing of Serbia. Arkan blamed NATO for bombing of civilians and creating refugees of all ethnicities, and stated that he would deploy his troops only in the case of NATO direct ground invasion.

The scandalous bombing of Chinese Embassy in Belgrade in which three journalists were killed, and that led to a diplomatic row between the U.S.A. and China, is alleged to have been a result of precise and deliberate targeting because the office of the Chinese military attaché was being used by Arkan to communicate and transmit messages to his `Tigers', Serb death squads in Kosmet. NATO also bombed the Hotel Yugoslavia where Arkan had a casino because of information that it served as his staff for military operations in Kosovo. There were reports that NATO commandos planned to kidnap and kill Arkan.

During the time of the NATO airstrikes on Yugoslavia, Arkan made a number of appearances via satellite link as a guest on news networks across the nations involved in the attacks. In the U.K he was interviewed by both BBC and Sky and other groups, and in one of them he famously quoted a rather biblical response to the question "Why did Milošević cancel the autonomy of the Kosovar Albanians a few years ago where tensions were high?" when he stated (fluently in English), "The president giveth, and the president taketh, Blessed be the name!"

Death

The process of eliminating men close to Arkan in order to weaken him and his movement began immediately after the end of the Bosnian war. Serbian secret state police organized dozens of murders of his most devoted and trusted people. His war buddies, long-standing friends, and business partners were all killed professionally within a short period of time. Arkan was angry and touched with these acts against him and felt sorrow for his fallen comrades. This circle of killings of specific types of people who collaborated with him continued even after Arkan's murder.

Arkan was assassinated, on January 15, 2000, at 17:05 GMT in lobby of the elite and fancy Intercontinental Hotel, Belgrade full of hotel guests. His Assassin, Dobrosav Gavrić, a 23 years old policeman on sick leave who briefly was member of Arkan's militia, walked up alone toward him from behind. Arkan was seating and chatting with two of his friends. Gavrić waited for a few minutes and used calm and surprise to sneak unnoticed to them and fire bullets from his duty pistol "CZ 99". Arkan was shot from behind three times in back of the head and lapsed into a coma on the spot, fatally wounded from close range. His companions Milenko Mandić, a business manager, and Dragan Garić, police inspector, were also shot to death by Gavrić. Gavrić was shot and wounded immediately after by Arkan's bodyguard Zvonko Mateović and fell unconscious while one woman was seriously wounded in a further shoot out between them. After complicated surgery Gavrić survived but remained an invalid in a wheelchair as result of a spinal wound. Gavrić pleaded innocent and never admitted that he committed the hideous crime. He was convicted guilty and sentenced to 20 years of jail, his accomplices received from 15 to 3 years each, after a one year trial. However the original court verdict has been cancelled recently because of a lack of evidence and the vagueness of first trial process, and a new trial is conducted.

Arkan was still alive despite having been shot in the head when his bodyguard put him in the car of a passenger who drove him to a hospital. Doctors tried resuscitation for over one hour in vain, although they managed to revive him for a moment. Death was officially concluded at 18:50. Arkan actually died on arrival having passed away in wife's arms on the way to hospital. Police officers refused to drive him under the pretense that they were not authorized to do so until an emergency truck arrived.

According to some reliable sources, Arkan's termination was a well prepared and thought-out plan that was carefully planned for seven months. The killing was carried out in mob-style to give the appearance that he was a victim of gang war, but it was actually complex assassination of political nature. The group of conspirators numbered many people. In conspiracy against him were involved criminals, businessmen, policemen, and politicians, who all gather together to get rid of him, each from their own reasons and interests. Some people from Arkan's close associates began making ambitious plans for their own path to ascension without him, and joined in plotting as inside spies for a secret project. A huge amount of money was promised for his murder, about 4,5 millions of DM which after the bloody job was done they would split among themselves. When later the terrible truth about his murder come out in public it became clear that Arkan was not killed by foreign enemies but by Serbs.

Slobodan Milošević gaved a top secret order for urgent removal of Arkan in June 1999 to his henchman, former chief of secret state security Radomir Marković. Marković ordered his outside operative a "businessman" Andrija Drašković, to find killers and coordinate the rest of the mission. Drašković hired his fellow gangsters Dragan Nikolić, called Gagi, and Zoran Uskoković, called Skole. Dragan Nikolić involved his friend Dobrosav Gavrić and relative Milan Đuričić, in the secret mission. They were people in whom he had full confidence. Đuričić was his first cousin while Gavrić was his best man. Together with Skole and his gang they secretly planned and organized Arkan's murder in his apartment. There is also information that Borislav Pelević served as inside man for the plot against Arkan. Security services also wiretapped Arkan shortly before his murder. For four months they followed Arkan's movements and whereabouts, learning his habits.

Arkan gained too much power and become dangerous for the regime, especially after publication of Milošević's indictment in May that year. After the capitulation of Serbia to NATO forces in Kosovo, Arkan did not needed them for wars any longer and now became an unpleasant witness to Milošević's secret sponsorship and state involvement in wars. In fact Arkan knew a lot about the state's internal functions and they were afraid they could not control him any more. But a hidden motive why this group of men wanted him dead is the hatred and envy they felt toward him.

After his violent death many concluded that he "got what he deserved" and "died in the same manner as he lived". Some stated that they preferred to see him on trial in The Hague. But for some Serbs Arkan represents a ultimate patriot and war legend.

In the last years of his life up to moment of his death Arkan calmed himself turning to family, friends and business, abandoning politics and contacts in the underworld. He began living a normal life and believed he could get over all obstacles and worries in life. Arkan even thought to write a self biography with memoirs. The title of that book would be as he once said to journalists "I, Arkan". His enemies did not allowed him to grow old in peace, have remorse for his sins nor to defend himself on trial by rights of law.

Željko Ražnatović Arkan was buried with military honors by his volunteers and with a Serbian orthodox mourning ceremonial on January 20, 2000. Around 20,000 people attended his funeral. There are still many speculations and doubts among Serbian public concerning his fascinating life and the shady legacy he left.

Quotes

• "Better to live one day as a lion, than hundred years as worm."

• "I am going to become a Serb Wiesenthal."

• "If only Russia was stronger, this chaos which is happening to us Serbs would have never happened."

• "It is obvious that political platform of my party is much more in spirit of Dayton agreement then any of leading national parties in Bosnia and because of that my party is deserved to be subsidized by OSCE."

• "Milošević is a true Serb leader."

• "I never hated Croats, I just shot at them."

• "I was first for democracy after communism fell, but America must know that democracy is not imposed with bombs."

• "As a proud Serb I would be more glad if those people bravely died in battlefield and that we can remember them as heroes which defended territories instead as disgracefully escaped wretched refugees."

• "Serbia isn't Somalia."

• "We are tigers and we certainly shall not allow that Serbian people be taken to slaughterhouse again. If they don't comprehend that, we do not left anything else than to march on Zagreb and completely military defeat them."

• "Security doesn't exist even here because our enemies draw in, among us."

• "I am watching all of you idlers."

• "I don't like intellectuals, they represent a closed circle."

• "My only supreme commander is my partriarch."

• "Serbia is in deterrent enemy encirclement."

• "Here doesn't exist line of front, this is hellish war."

• "Yes I was on the other side of law, but I wouldn't recommend it to no one, that is not way to solve any problems, just with decent life and sports."

• "Did I ever said I was a good boy in my childhood or that I finished high school with success, no I was a mischievous little devil."

• "They don't have to rape anybody. Serbian women adore my 'tigers'."

• "We are in sanctions and isolation. Reason: we lost a media war."

• "If we have managed to survive 500 years under Turks we can endure at least 100 years more in sanctions."

• "As a warrior I am sending a message to Croats and their former masters Nazi Germany and all Catholic mafia who make us this problems: keep yourselves from a Serb Volunteer Guard and Serbian people."

• "We can defeat everyone, even the whole world."

• "They slaughtered my soldiers, what did you expect from me to do to set free those prisoners?"

• "I am not a rich man, I have raised credits in bad time, so I am in large debts now."

• "I loved only two women in my life, I never was womanizer."

• "If somebody wants to kill me he will do it no matter what stands on his way."

• "There where we are, wrote freely, Tuđman got no chance."

• "We shall manure Kosovo soil with Albanian terrorists."

• "Muslims are like wild dogs. You can't deal with them, you must kill them."

• "We came here to help this people."

• "I have nine children I would be crazy if I want a war."

• "Brothers Serbs, what a cattle you are!"

• "I attacked in wedge of enemy like Caesar... When we finish with foreign enemies, we shall turn to Serbian traitors. We shall not kill or pursue them, we are going to whip them fifty times by buttocks to set them straight."

• "First let them call in Hague Tribunal those who destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki those who killed civilians in that two towns, who attacked Panama and Grenada and after them me. When I was defending somebody else's houses and women I was defending myself."

• "Hague to judge me? That is funny. I don't give a damn about that. I can only judge them."

• "To threat me with murder, I risked my life thousand times, I got threats from everyone, it is silly, simply those things doesn't touch me at all."

• "If you would have followed my entire life story way I do, you would see I am man of my own not a pion or someone's man."

• "I am proud which NATO is my enemy, that means I am good Serb."

• "I am not afraid of anyone and anything."