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The Croatian Six (consisting of Max Bebic, Vic Brajkovic, Tony Zvirotic, Joe Kokotovic, his brother Ilija Kokotovic and Mile Nekic) were six Croatian-Australian men sentenced to 15 years jail in 1981 for a conspiracy to bomb several targets in Sydney,[1] including a Yugoslavian travel agent, the former Elizabethan Theatre in Newtown and a major water supply line in St Marys in western Sydney.[2] The trial was one of the longest in Australian legal history.[2] An appeal for these convictions and sentences failed,[3] and the men were subsequently imprisoned for 10 years before being released in 1991.[4]

Media investigations since the trial, such as for the ABC's Four Corners programme and The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper, suggested that much of the evidence on which the six were charged was fabricated and that the men were set up as part a sting operation by the Yugoslav foreign intelligence service, UDBA. Intelligence sources later confirmed that Dr Georgi Trajkovski, the Yugoslav Consul General in Melbourne, was a UDBA operative and a key player in the Croatian Six set up.[5][6] Disgraced former detective Roger Rogerson, one of the arresting officers; later admitted that planting evidence during the 1970s and 80s was part of police culture.[7]

The case also drew attention from John Schindler, then at the US Naval War College, who claimed that the Croatian Six affair was "a 'classic' agent provocateur operation run by the intelligence agency of the then communist regime in Belgrade, known as the UDBA, against exile communities that were against the Yugoslavian federation."[2] He also claimed that former UDBA officials said that the Croatian Six case was "one of their great successes" in completely discrediting the Croatian Australian community. According to Schindler, Australian Security Intelligence Organisation would have (or at least should have) been aware of UDBA's involvement.[2]

Ian Cunliffe, formerly a senior lawyer in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, claimed intelligence material was withheld that would have resulted in not guilty verdicts for the Croatian Six. This material was purposely kept from then Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser and subpoenas by defence lawyers in the trial were not allowed on "national security grounds".[2]

In 2012, three of the surviving five men — Max Bebic, Mile Nekic and Vic Brajkovic — represented by human rights lawyer Sebastian De Brennan, applied to the NSW Supreme Court for a judicial review of their convictions.[2] This application was dismissed,[8] however in August 2022 the NSW Supreme Court ordered a review into the convictions based on the declassification of relevant ASIO documents.[9]

In popular culture

References

  1. ^ "Australia's greatest miscarriage of justice? The Croatian Six - part one". ABC Radio National. 2021-02-02. Retrieved 2023-03-03.
  2. ^ a b c d e f McDonald, Hamish (12 February 2012). "Terror six claim it was fix". Sydney Morning Herald.
  3. ^ McDonald, Hamish (11 February 2012). "Framed: the untold story about the Croatian Six". Sydney Morning Herald.
  4. ^ "Australia's greatest miscarriage of justice? The Croatian Six - part one". ABC News. Australian Broadcasting Commission. 2 February 2021. Retrieved 9 January 2023.
  5. ^ Sasha Uzunov (25 July 2011). "Who Was The Croatian Six Mastermind?". SCOOP Independent News. Retrieved 11 October 2017.
  6. ^ "Australia's greatest miscarriage of justice? The Croatian Six - part two". ABC Radio National. 2022-05-17. Retrieved 2023-03-03.
  7. ^ Watson, Joey (8 February 2021). "The Croatian Six spent more than a decade in jail over a bomb plot. Now they want to clear their names". ABC News. Australian Broadcasting Commission. Retrieved 9 January 2023.
  8. ^ McDonald, Hamish (11 February 2013). "Bid for review of Croatian Six terrorist convictions again fails". Sydney Morning Herald.
  9. ^ "Application by Maksimilian Bebic, Mile Nekic and Vjekoslav Brajkovic pursuant to s 78 of the Crimes (Appeal and Review) Act 2001 (NSW) [2022] NSWSC 1153". Case Law NSW. Retrieved 9 January 2023.
  10. ^ McDonald, Hamish (11 February 2012). "Framed: the untold story about the Croatian Six". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 19 January 2024.
  11. ^ a b Pitt, Helen (19 January 2024). "A secret love, the Croatian Six and the turbulence of 1970s Australia". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 19 January 2024.
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