Mate Boban
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Mate Boban (1940 - July 7, 1997) was a Herzegovian Croat politician and leader of the Bosnian-Herzegovinian Croats during the Bosnian-Herzegovinian War. Boban was the first and only president of the short lived Herzeg-Bosnia which was never recognized but existed between 1991-1994. He was virulently anti-Bosniak and maintained friendly relationships with the Serbs even when the Croats were fighting the JNA and RSK.
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[edit] Pre-war life
Mate Boban was born in the village of Sovići in the municipality of Grude, Kingdom of Yugoslavia (present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina). Prior to the war he managed a publishing company in Imotski, Croatia and subsequently was a bureaucrat in a tobacco factory in Zagreb. Although he had been a member of the communist party since the 1950s he joined the HDZ (Croatian Democratic Union) a nationalist Croat party as soon as it was founded. He was eventually elected to the Bosnian-Herzegovinian parliament and served as HDZ vice-president before rising to the position of party president in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
[edit] Establishing Herzeg-Bosnia
On November 18, 1991 Boban proclaimed the existence of the 'Croatian Community of Herzeg-Bosnia', as a separate "political, cultural, economic and territorial whole," on the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina. This was, allegedely, in keeping with an agreement between Croatian president Franjo Tuđman and Serbian president Slobodan Milošević to divide Bosnia and Herzegovina between themselves[citation needed]. Boban met with Bosnian Serb president Radovan Karadžić during May 1992 in Graz, Austria where they agreed on mutual cooperation in the division of Bosnia and Herzegovina (the pair met again on September 2, 1993 in Montenegro in order to coordinate their actions after the Bosniaks rejected the Vance-Owen peace plan). Boban ordered the assassination of Bosnian-Herzegovinian Croats who opposed his plans[citation needed].The most well known were Stjepan Kljuić, Blaž Kraljević and Tomislav Dretar. Kraljević was lured to a meeting on August 9th, 1992 and was assassinated along with 8 of his deputies. Dretar survived assassination attempts but was isolated in the Bihać enclave throughout the war and as such could not oppose Boban effectively. Stjepan Kljuić remained opposed to Boban for the duration of the war.
[edit] Bosnian-Herzegovinian War
The deal called for the Serbs to aid the Croats in defeating the Bosniaks and carving a piece of Bosnia and Herzegovina and incorporating it into Croatia. Tensions mounted from June 1992 until early 1993. After many Croat provocations and hostile acts, open warfare broke out in April 1993 between Croats and Bosniaks. The Croat militia, the HVO, attacked and expelled Bosniaks all over central and southern Bosnia and Herzegovina, all the while they committed many atrocities against civilians. Examples of this include the massacres in Stupni Do and Ahmici. By early 1994 the tide was turning against the Croats. The Republic of Croatia was spending an estimated 3 million Deutsche Mark on the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina every day and faced heavy international criticism for its role in supporting the HVO. The US forced a peace treaty, known as the Washington Accords which were signed in March 1994. Subsequently Pope John Paul II and the US government forced the ouster of Boban.[1].
[edit] Post war life and death
After the Washington accords ended Herzeg-Bosnia Boban went into retirement. On July 4, 1997 he had a stroke and died three days later at a hospital in Mostar. His funeral attracted no foreign dignitaries, but did attract many like minded Croats such as Gojko Šušak. There are persistent, but unproven rumors that his death was faked to avoid being tried for war crimes.[2]
