The Gabela camp or Gabela prison was a
prison camp run by the
Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia
The Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia () was an unrecognized geopolitical entity and quasi-state in Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bosnia and Herzegovina. It was proclaimed on 18 November 1991 under the name Croatian Community of Herzeg-Bos ...
and
Croatian Defence Council
The Croatian Defence Council (, HVO) was the armed wing of the self-proclaimed Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia, a breakaway entity unrecognised by the international community and accused of ethnic-based violence during the conflict. It exis ...
in
Gabela. The camp was located several kilometres south of
Čapljina
Čapljina ( cyrl, Чапљина, ) is a city located in Herzegovina-Neretva Canton of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, an entity of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is located on the border with Croatia a mere from the Adriatic Sea.
The rive ...
. Its prisoners were
Bosniaks
The Bosniaks (, Cyrillic script, Cyrillic: Бошњаци, ; , ) are a South Slavs, South Slavic ethnic group native to the Southeast European historical region of Bosnia (region), Bosnia, today part of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and who sha ...
and
Serbs
The Serbs ( sr-Cyr, Срби, Srbi, ) are a South Slavs, South Slavic ethnic group native to Southeastern Europe who share a common Serbian Cultural heritage, ancestry, Culture of Serbia, culture, History of Serbia, history, and Serbian lan ...
.
The camp
The camp consisted of detention facilities and a munitions warehouse. "Outside observers were not allowed to visit Gabela until August 1993. At this time the ICRC registered 1,100 inmates."
The camp facilities were ammunition depots belonging to the former
Yugoslav Army, consisting of four hangars marked 0, 1, 2, and 3, and three solitary confinement cells. The hangar size was 200 square metres, and up to 500 persons were held inside each. The detainees were exhausted by starvation and thirst, and were tortured. Ten litres of water were provided per 500 persons per day, so many drank urine to quench their thirst. The detainees had to perform their bodily functions in the hangars. They were forced to sing Croatian nationalist songs and to listen to lectures on how correct Croatian policies were.
Upon entering the camp, detainees were exposed to special forms of torture. They were ordered to lie on their stomachs, and they would then be brutally beaten on their backs and heads. Some had their fingers broken by clamps. In early October, the camp warden, Boško Previšić, killed Mustafa Obradović in front of hangar No. 1, in the presence of a large number of detainees, after discovering a piece of bread concealed on him. Boško was seen talking to warcriminal mercenary and murderer
Jackie Arklöv
Jackie Banny Arklöv (born 6 June 1973) is a Swedish convicted murderer and bankrobber. Arklöv is an ex-neo-Nazi, Yugoslav Wars mercenary and war criminal, who, with two other neo-Nazis, murdered two police officers after a bank robbery in 1999 ...
in the camp, before and after Arklöv had tortured prisoners.
[Magnus Sandelin: "Den svarte nazisten". Bokförlaget forum, 2011. .]
Trials
The former manager of the Gabela camp Boško Previšić has not been prosecuted and remains a fugitive. His deputy Nikola Andrun was sentenced to 13 years in prison for the crimes against civilians in Gabela by the State Court in Sarajevo.
Former mercenary, Neo-Nazi, convicted bankrobber
Jackie Arklöv
Jackie Banny Arklöv (born 6 June 1973) is a Swedish convicted murderer and bankrobber. Arklöv is an ex-neo-Nazi, Yugoslav Wars mercenary and war criminal, who, with two other neo-Nazis, murdered two police officers after a bank robbery in 1999 ...
was stationed at the camp as a guard and was convicted by
Swedish
Swedish or ' may refer to:
Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically:
* Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland
** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
court for brutal tortures of inmates there.
See also
*
Čelebići prison camp Čelebići may refer to:
* Čelebići, Foča, a village in the municipality of Foča, Bosnia and Herzegovina
* Čelebići, Konjic, a village in the municipality of Konjic, Bosnia and Herzegovina
** Čelebići camp, a former prison camp in that vill ...
*
Dretelj camp
The Dretelj concentration camp or Dretelj prison was a prison camp run by the Croatian Defence Forces (HOS) and later by the Croatian Defence Council (HVO) during the Bosnian War.
The camp
The camp was located near Čapljina and Medjugorje in s ...
*
Heliodrom camp
The Heliodrom camp ( sh-Latn-Cyrl, Logor Heliodrom, Логор Хелиодром) or Heliodrom prison was a detention camp that operated between September 1992 and April 1994. It was run by the Military Police of the Croatian Republic of Herzeg- ...
*
Keraterm camp
The Keraterm camp was a concentration camp established by Army of Republika Srpska, Republika Srpska military and police authorities near the town of Prijedor in northern Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Bosnian War. The camp was used to collect ...
*
Manjača camp
Manjača was a concentration camp which was located on mount Manjača near the city of Banja Luka in northern Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Bosnian War and the Croatian War of Independence from 1991 to 1995. The camp was founded by the Yugosl ...
*
Omarska camp
The Omarska camp was a concentration camp run by the Army of Republika Srpska in the mining town of Omarska, near Prijedor in northern Bosnia and Herzegovina, set up for Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) and Bosnian Croat prisoners during the Prijedor ...
*
Musala camp
*
Trnopolje camp
The Trnopolje camp was an internment camp established by Republika Srpska military and police authorities in the village of Trnopolje near Prijedor in northern Bosnia and Herzegovina, during the first months of the Bosnian War. Also variously ter ...
*
Uzamnica camp
Uzamnica camp was an internment camp established in 1992 by the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) forces housing Bosniak civilian prisoners during the Bosnian War.
Many of the Bosniaks who were not killed in the Višegrad massacres were detained at v ...
*
Vilina Vlas
Vilina Vlas is a former concentration camp and hotel in eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina where UN experts have spoken of systematic detention and rape of the area's Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) or non-Serb girls and women during the Bosnian War. The sp ...
*
Vojno camp
Vojno camp was a detention camp set up by the Croatian Defence Council (HVO) from June 1993 to March 1994, to detain tens of thousands of Bosniaks in the Mostar municipality. Bosniaks in the camp were subject to killings, mistreatment, rapes, det ...
Notes
References
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;News
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;Other
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{{Bosnian War
Vanjski linkovi
Čapljina portal umrli
1992 establishments in Bosnia and Herzegovina
1994 disestablishments in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Croatian war crimes in the Bosnian War
Croatian concentration camps in the Yugoslav Wars
Čapljina
Bosnian War internment camps