The statue you see right here commemorates the victims that fell during the Novi Sad Raid
in January 1942; these were mostly Serbs and Jews. The perpetrator: the
Royal Hungarian Army. This here is a story about the forgotten Novi Sad Massacre, keep watching.
Due to the Treaty of Trianon, which was signed in 1920, Hungary lost much of its territory
leaving the population and politicians resentful and the main aim of the Hungarian politicians
during the interwar period was the redrawing of the old borders, but this was not going to
be easy. Hungary was surrounded by larger states such as Czechoslovakia, Romania and the Kingdom
of Yugoslavia, which formed the Little Entente, which was backed by France to keep the country in check.
Hungary made an alliance with Germany and when Hitler rose to power revision of the old
borders seemed possible. Hitler stressed that 100% revision simply was not realistic,
however when Germany was overturning the status quo in the second half of the 1930s things seemed
to be possible and that happened during the First and Second Vienna Award (1938 and 1940) where
Hungary gained territory from Czechoslovakia and Romania. In November 1940 Hungary joined the
Axis Powers. Despite signing a treaty with Yugoslavia (the Treaty of Eternal Friendship)
Germany pressed Hungary into participating in the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia. Shortly after
the Germans set foood on Yugoslav soil, Croatia seceded from the Yugoslav Kingdom and this was
the green light for the Hungarian invasion of the country: the Hungarian army suffered
126 deaths and 241 wounded. Hungary took control and annexed two continguous areas of Yugoslavia: a part
Hungarians occupied was a Slovene area of Prekmurje and a Croatian area of Međimurje. Hungary also gained
control of Bačka and Baranja. The occupation started with violence orders of Elemér Gorondy-Novák permitted the
taking of hostages and executions if necessary. Public executions occurred in Zombor (Sombor) as well as
Szabadka (Subotica). Around 10,000 people were expelled to Serbia, Croatia or Montenegro. In the second half of 1941
resistance broke out: initially small in scale the Hungarian occupation authorities responded
by executing repressive measures. When the German invasion of the USSR, codenamed Operation
Barbarosa, commenced Moscow ordered the Communist Party of Yugoslavia to pick up arms against the
Axis occupiers. Hungarian police stations were raided as well as warehouses and communication
lines were cut by the Yugoslav resistance; some Hungarian officers were brutally killed. From
July 1941 the Hungarian authorities sent a special court to the area which carried out over 100 death
sentences; thousands were put in prison. On the 5th of January 1942 the chief of the Hungarian
general staff ordered a large scale raid against the Partisans in the area. Now the thing was the
group of Partisans was not big: 40, and they were all killed or captured. Colonel General József Bajnóczy
wanted to seize the opportunity to get rid of all unwanted elements and thus to give the population
a deterring example. The following day the Germans demanded full Hungarian deployment on
the Eastern front. Hungarian foreign minister László Bárdossy he did not want this and he pointed out
that the Hungarian Army was needed at home to protect its own territory. It is said he asked the
Hungarian field gendarmerie for evidence of a large scale partisan uprising. On the 20th of January
1942 the communication lines of Novi Sad (Újvidék) were cut off by the Hungarian forces. As they surrounded the city
and then entered it people were rounded up: “Long lines of Jews and “Communists” (the latter mostly
Serbs), including children, were brought by trucks, ordered to strip to their underwear, and then taken
to a hole in the ice where they were either shot or simply pushed in (some with hands tied in their
back by wire). This lasted all day, until about 4 p.m., when an officer arrived and said that the
long line of about 1,000 people should be taken back to the city and released because, as he told
them, “all the guilty people have now been executed.” In the city as well as the surrounding towns 3,340
individuals were murdered on the 23rd of January. Now most of them were Serbs and Jews but not all: “[B]reaking
this figure down by nationality, this involved 2,550 Serbs, 743 Jews, 11 Hungarians, 13 Russians,
7 Germans, and 16 persons of other nationalities. Of these, 3,193 were adults and 147 were children.”
People were pushed in the frozen Danube where they either froze to death or drowned and not
one functionary of the Yugoslav Communist party was among the victims. Whole families were wiped
out so in order nobody of the families could take revenge. In other towns people were killed
as well. In Zsabja some 653 and in Temerin around 40. In Novi Sad the Hungarians put weapons next to
the bodies and photographed them to make it look like they were armed. As Colonel Grassy stated on
the 23 January: ‘even though, in the course of this unwelcome raid, which also was contrary to the
Hungarian character, irresponsible and rebellious elements in at least 30–40 cases attacked our
Honvéds and gendarmes with rifles and grenades, wounding many’. The Hungarian actions were criticized
by the mayor of Novi Sad and also by the Germans and also within the Hungarian parliament the raid
was heavily criticized. The chief of the General Staff, Colonel Szombathelyi ordered a special investigation
in April 1942 which was halted by Regent Miklós Horthy. However he later ordered an investigation
into the massacres and as a result charges were brought against those responsible. However these
fled to Germany and returned once Germany had taken over the country in 1944. One of them was
this man; after the war he was found guilty of war crimes and executed. The Jews of the occupied
territories were subjected to forced labor by the Hungarian authorities. Over 15,000 were
sent to labor camps within Hungary and some had to perform labor tasks for the Hungarian Army on the
Eastern Front. Speaking of, the Hungarians suffered huge losses on the Eastern Front. This became
known as a disaster on the Don. Then the Hungarian government wanted to exit the war; it made attempts
to reach the Western Allies by the end of 1943. The Germans became aware of this and took control of
the country in March 1944. Regent Miklós Horthy was allowed to remain as head of state. The Germans
superimposed their rule over the Hungarian annexed Yugoslav areas. Horthy continued to contact the
allies and managed to reach an armistice with the Soviets when Soviet forces were well within
the borders of Hungary. When the Germans learned about this they overthrew Horthy and installed Ferenc
Szalasi, the leader of the Hungarian Arrow Cross party which was the Hungarian fascist party. Little could
be done to stop the Soviet onslaught and ethnic Germans from Backa and Baranja were evacuated to
Austria in October 1944. By the end of that month Soviet, Bulgarian and Partisan forces had cleared
the area of German troops. The areas of Medjimurje and Prekmurje were taken by Bulgarian forces.
What followed were purges and many ethnic Germans and Hungarians fell victim to this: an
estimated 55,000 were killed in these communist purges. The memorial here says: 'Remembrance is a
memorial harder than stone. If we are people we must forgive, but must not forget.' In June
2013 Hungarian President János Áder apologized in Belgrade for the war crimes committed against
civilian (Serbs and Jewish people) during the Hungarian occupation of the Yugoslav territories.
Before that the Serbian parliament had condemned the 1944-45 violence against Hungarians in Vojvodina.