In the 2003
ICTYVojislav Šešelj indictment, the group is included as an alleged party in the
joint criminal enterprise, in which Vojislav Šešelj allegedly took part. In the indictment the group is identified as "volunteer units including '
Chetnik', or Šešeljevci" (
Serbian Cyrillic: Шешељевци).[4] This association has been denied by SRS leader Vojislav Šešelj.[5]
Name
Although the group's members were occasionally referred to as
Chetniks,[6] The name White Eagles comes from an anti-communist organisation that was formed during
World War II and continued a guerrilla war against
Tito's government after the war. [citation needed] White Eagle refers to the
national symbol of
Serbia, the double headed white eagle under a crown.
History
The White Eagles paramilitary group was formed in late 1990 by
Dragoslav Bokan and
Mirko Jović. The group split into different factions as Bokan and Jović went their separate ways in 1992.[7][8][9] Jović called for "a Christian, Orthodox Serbia with no Muslims and no unbelievers".[10][11]
Šešelj states that the group was started by Jović but they got out of his control.[12] According to Šešelj, the White Eagles and Arkan's Tigers operated with help from the
Yugoslav counterintelligence service.[13]
War crimes
Paramilitary units are responsible for some of the most brutal aspects of "
ethnic cleansing". Two of the units that have played a major role in the "ethnic cleansing" campaign in BiH, the "
Cetniks" associated with
Vojislav Šešelj and the "
Tigers" associated with
Željko Ražnatović (Arkan), have been active in the Republic of Serbia as well. Seselj's followers have reportedly waged "ethnic cleansing" campaigns against ethnic minorities in Serbia's provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo.[14]
— Report of the United Nations Commission on ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Herzegovina
In December 2010 a group called "White Eagles" (
Serbian: Бели Орлови / Beli Orlovi) took responsibility for the killing of Kosovo's
Bosniak leader Šefko Salković in the north of Kosovo. The group also took responsibility for obstructions of the election process in northern Kosovska Mitrovica, as well as for attacking
KFOR troops.[25][26]
^
abcAllen, Beverly (1996) Rape Warfare: The Hidden Genocide in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, Minnesota, pp. 154-155,
ISBN0-8166-2818-1
^Lukic, Rénéo (1996). Europe from the Balkans to the Urals: The Disintegration of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. Oxford University Press. p. 190.
ISBN978-0-19-829200-5.
^VOA News,
Kosovo Holds First Parliamentary Election, 12 December 2010. "A Serb group calling itself White Eagles claimed responsibility for the attack - and also said it carried out the killing of a Bosniak election official last week."