Tezno – najveće prikriveno grobište u Sloveniji. O istraživanju grobišta u protutenkovskom rovu u Teznom (Maribor)
Tezno – The Biggest Hidden Mass Burial Site in Slovenia. On the Research of the Hidden Burial Site in the Antitank Ditch in Tezno (Maribor)

Summary/Abstract: During May of 1945 Slovenian town of Maribor was location of several centers where captured and repatriated members of the Armed forces of the Independent State of Croatia were concentrated. From these centers prisoners were taken by trucks to various locations where they were shot. The most widely used of the location was a former antitank ditch in Tezno. The ditch was several kilometers long and stretched from the river Drava to the slopes of mountain Pohorje. Today the exact location of the complete trench cannot be completely established and it can also not be exactly established what amount of the former trench were used to bury executed prisoners. In 1999, during the construction of highway near Maribor, the construction workers found the human remains. From the part of the former trench, stretching along 70 meters, remains of 1179 persons were excavated. That would mean that approximately 17 persons were buried along each meter of the trench. At that time there was no other research dealing with this burial site and there were conflicting information about the number of persons buried at that location. In order to gain more complete information Slovenian government’s commission for hidden burial sites decided to continue research in Tezno in 2007. Probing was conducted and it was established that the former antitank ditch is filled with human remains along the length of 940 meters (!). Mathematical calculation can bring us to an estimate that around 15000 persons were buried in the trench. According to this estimate Tezno is the biggest of all of 600 locations in Slovenia that are known as hidden burial sites. Available documents and testimonies can give us at least a partial reconstruction about the mass executions in Tezno. Executions were conducted by 15. Majevica brigade and 6. Eastern-Bosnian brigade of the 17. Eastern-Bosnian division of the III. Yugoslav army. Executions began on May 20 and were finished on May 26, 1945. Available data also give information on how the executions were carried out, on the number of executed persons and their nationality. It is also obvious that Yugoslav army tried to conceal the executions and burial site from American and British reconnaissance airplanes that flew over Maribor area. All the available data prove that executions were not an act of spontaneous revenge against the crimes previously committed by members of Croatian Armed Forces. Instead it was a well planned and thoroughly conducted execution of prisoners of war. Decision to execute the prisoners was previously made by communist and state authorities of the new Yugoslav state and its technical realization was organized by heads of new Yugoslav state security police (Odjeljenje zaštite naroda, Ozna) several weeks before the final battles of World War II. It is now known that the 1. Yugoslav army organized a special centre with several officers of Ozna. It can be safely assumed that other Yugoslav armies (2nd, 3rd and 4th) also organized...

• Details
• Contents