Croatia: Wiesenthal Centre urges end to Nazi allies pensions

Via AFP:

The Nazi-hunting Simon Wiesenthal Center on Tuesday urged Croatia to stop paying pensions to people who served in the country's World War II Nazi-allied armed forces, labelling the policy an insult to their victims.

"In view of the horrendous war crimes committed in the so-called Independent State of Croatia (NDH)... such a policy is inherently mistaken," the centre's chief Nazi hunter Efraim Zuroff said in a letter to Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic.

Paying pensions to members of the WWII Ustasha armed forces is a "horrific insult to the victims, their families and all Croatians with a sense of morality and integrity," Zuroff stressed in a Wiesenthal Center statement quoting from his letter.

The Nazi-allied Ustasha authorities persecuted and killed hundreds of thousands of ethnic Serbs, Jews, Gypsies and anti-fascist Croatians.

Croatia is currently paying around 10,000 such pensions, to those still living or their spouses, which costs the European Union member around 50 million euros ($56 million) yearly, according to estimates.