Croat town remembers fall

Vukovar was reduced to rubble in 1991

By the BBC's Alix Kroeger in Vukovar

In the Croatian town of Vukovar several thousand people have taken part in a march to commemorate the day 10 years ago when the town fell to the besieging Yugoslav national army.

The march ended at a war cemetery on the edge of Vukovar where many of those killed in the siege were buried.

Extreme nationalists jeered Croatia's moderate president, Stipe Mesic, as he arrived, but most people came simply to remember the dead.

By the time the procession reached Vukovar's main war cemetery it had swelled to several thousand.

Hospital massacre

The march began at the town's hospital, where more than 260 patients, both soldiers and civilians, were taken away and executed in November 1991.

The marchers placed red and white funeral candles along their route.

They gathered round the cross at the centre of the cemetery to pray and listen to hymns for the dead.

Some wore military uniforms, others had draped themselves in the flag, but most were civilians, young and old alike, many of them survivors of the three-month siege which destroyed Vukovar.

They clutched red roses; the men held their hats in their hands.

Neo-Nazi demonstrations

The war graves are all the same - a black headstone with a name, date and a photo engraving of the deceased.

The inscription reads simply: Croatian defender.

Outside the cemetery gate a small group of neo-fascist demonstrators sang nationalist songs recalling Croatia's Nazi puppet regime during the Second World War.

The relationship between Croatian nationalism, Nazi sympathisers and the war 10 years ago is an uneasy one.

While most came to Vukovar to pay their respects to the dead, there are still those who seek to use its sufferings to stir up nationalist fervour.