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freakingoutthesquares · 2 years ago

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Mojo Britpop Special 2009 This Year’s Model. Transcription: Me.

A mix of Celtic yobs and art school wits, Pulp created a culturally momentous update of old school glam. But joining London's glitterati fragmented them. By Roy Wilkinson.

At the 96 BRITS, whilst Jarvis Cocker was making himself known to Michael Jackson via a stage invasion, bandmate Russell Senior was making another acquaintance. ‘I met Chris Eubank,’ says Russell of the monocle wearing former boxer. ‘We were getting on famously, but after the Jackson incident he folded his arms and turned away because he was a huge Jackson fan. I'd been having this interesting conversation, about art, philosophy... But Jarvis ruined it!’ [Laughs] ‘Though he had a point, of course.’

A phenomenon as chummy as Britpop was never likely to produce seditious acts similar to self-immolating monks or suffragettes throwing themselves under horses. Cocker's BRITS incursion was perfect - a commando raid as envisaged by Charlie Chaplin. If the Britpop was a national Jubilee, Cocker’s assault was the feat of bravado that marked the party at its peak - before dawn revealed the broken glass and trampled flower beds.

With nothing but a stylised posterior display and glare full of silent movie distain Cocker derailed Jackson’s plan to recast himself as a mix of Jesus, David Attenborough and Doctor Bernardo. Surrounded by children, images of wildlife and actors done up as representatives of the world's key religions, Jacko sang on through Earth Song, oblivious to Cocker’s presence. But the rest of the world noticed, and there were consequences.

Jarvis was locked up at Kensington police station, Brian Eno took out a pro-Cocker advert in industry paper Music Week, while Simon and Yasmin Le Bon appeared in the Daily Mirror wearing ‘Justice for Jarvis’ T-shirts. An act that united the ex-Roxy Music pop sage with the Duran Duran singer was an appropriately odd reflection of the way Pulp’s uneven career embraced both high and low art. By the time Cocker gatecrashed Jackson's performance, Pulp had been going 18 years. Jarvis, a single minded fellow, was the only surviving original member.

Russell Senior left Pulp after ‘Jacksongate’ in January 1997. He'd been with the band since 1983, effectively operating as Jarvis, his right-hand man. When I spoke to Russell, he was attempting to create a nesting site for kingfishers in the garden of his three-bedroom family home in Sheffield. Conversation ranged from Suede and Oasis to Russell’s fascination for central Europe. He recently visited Criona, a Serb enclave in Croatia. The band's guitarist and multi-instrumentalist, Russell quit Pulp, citing artistic frustration and the desire to spend more time with his family. He'd been part of Pulp’s slow ascent to 1995’s Different Class album, the band's commercial and critical peak, cut by a line up completed by keyboard player Candida Doyle, drummer Nick Banks and bassist Steve Mackey.

Jarvis wasn't the only member of Pulp to trespass at the BRITS. Cocker was accompanied by Peter Mansell, Pulp bassist, from 84 to 87. Mansell’s presence at the BRITS was a subtle reminder of the bands long torturous history. They survived years on the dole and lived through the Miners’ Strike, during which Russell served on the picket lines. Pulp finally reached the masses during Britpop's commercial peak in 95. But for Senior. Britpop began earlier, on a night in Paris in October 1991. Pulp were third on the bill to Blur and Lush.

‘My first experience of Blur,’ says Russell,’ was walking into their dressing room in Paris and seeing them smashing this mirrored wall. The floor was covered in glass and Alex (James) was pouring champagne out of the window onto the people below. Damon (Albarn) was flicking spoonfuls of caviar out of a window. The first thing Graham (Coxon) said to me was, ‘We like your band. We're going to copy you.’ I used to do this kind of Pete Townsend arm fling. Next time I saw Blur, Graham was doing it but making it look more like a Nazi salute.’

‘Later I thought their Girls and Boys single was very Pulp. (Blur producer) Stephen Steet did say, ‘I know we've nicked your clothes a bit.’ But I'm not griping at Blur because they had the balls to do it bigger. For me, that night in Paris was the start of Britpop. It's not something I'm going to knock. I mean, there was a period little later when I started wearing Union Jack socks.’

Prior to Senior’s Britpop flashpoint in Paris, he is band had a 13 year pre-history - unlucky for some including, it seems, Pulp. The band came into being in 78, formed by Jarvis at school in Sheffield. They were known as Arabicus Pulp, the Arabicus coming from a copy of the Financial Times. It alluded to a commodities index featuring coffee arabica, found in Ethiopia and Yemen. Spiritually cursed by such obtuseness, Pulp spent the next 15 years plagued by tragicomic levels of ill omen and commercial failure. There were rehearsals in the building shared with table tennis clubs and model railway enthusiasts. According to Jarvis, these hobbyist sects were at daggers-drawn and expressed their antipathy by crapping outside each other’s doors. Jarvis said in 1993 that he devoted much of ‘It’ Pulp’s 83 debut to ‘writing all these songs about girls when I'd never had a proper girlfriend.’ When he did secure female attention, Cocker had unconventional ways of making an impression. He attempted to walk along a second-floor window ledge outside a Sheffield bookshop. He fell, breaking a wrist and ankle and fracturing his pelvis.

Subsequent shows saw Jarvis singing from a wheelchair - a sight some interpreted as grotesque take on the kind of ‘disability chic’ launched by a hearing-aid-adorned Morrissey. Pulp made an album for £600. The sales figure wasn't of a dissimilar magnitude. Pulp made three albums in these wilderness years. It was followed by Freaks (1987) and Separations (1991) [Actually 1992!]. Freaks’ subtitle - Ten Songs About Power, Claustrophobia, Suffocation and Holding Hands – said Pulp were still some way from the matily exuberant dimensions of, say, Blurs beery, Britpop totem Girls and Boys.

I first interviewed Jarvis and Russell in 87 around Freaks. They were genuinely amazed that then record company Fire had stretched to some chocolate biscuits to go with tea. The resulting article compared Pulp to Ian McEwan, Bertold Brecht and Carry On actor Charles Hawtrey.

‘It wasn't all about me and Jarvis by any means,’ says Russell of Freaks. ‘There was also this Celtic yob element which was (Belfast born) Candida Doyle, Magnus (Doyle, Candida’s brother and Pulp drummer at that point) and Pete Mansell. If it was just me and Jarvis, it would have all been very art school. The other three liked Sham 69… Actually, we all liked Sham 69. Perhaps that was the only thing we all had in common. In fact, we sometimes played Sham 69s Hurry up, Harry live.

After Freaks, Jarvis moved to London, studying at Central St. Martins College of Art and Design. Steve Mackey had joined Pulp on bass and was also in the capital studying film at the Royal College of Art. Soon Pulp were exhibiting a more playful mood and an unknowingly pop-art retrospection. There were concert flyers advocating ‘Pulp-ish’ things to do, such as ‘doing a wheelie on a Raleigh Chopper’ and ‘Going to the supermarket wearing a lurex jumper.’

This increasing friskiness - and references to the kind of 70s bicycling design that would soon turn up in the video for Supergrass’, Alright single - began to manifest itself in Pulp’s records. In the early 1990s they released a string of singles full of a new vivacity. In title, at least one single could hardly have given clearer indication that Pulp were now ready for revelry. It was called Razzamatazz.

Pulp left Fire for Island Records. The band's first album proper for Island was His’n’Hers in 1994. Now Pulp finally reached the Top 10 of the UK Albums Chart. The sleeve featured an airbrushed portrait of the band by Philip Castle, the artist best known for his poster image for the film A Clockwork Orange in 1971 - Pulp were a vision of sci-fi second-hand chic. The music included the same pop art reconfiguration of the past.

‘Glam rock was a big part of the picture,’ says Russell. ‘I'd written this mission statement for the band - about making the fairground music of the future. The music of dodgem cars and girls with love bites - the modern version of Sugar Baby Love by the Rubettes, anything by Slade and Sweet. In the dour time we were experiencing, there was a wistfulness for the exuberance of glam rock. We believed in glamour. We absolutely wanted to be pop stars - on our own terms, but pop stars nonetheless.’

With its vandals, acrylics and tales of sexual initiation His’n’Hers was a critical and commercial success. The next 16 months saw Pulp - Jarvis in particular - become a national treasure. Where once Cocker had occupied the mildewed margins, now he seemed to be permanently addressing the nation with wit, charm and the ability to correctly answer every question that Mike Read [it was Chris ‘Talent’ Tarrant actually!] asked in the quick fire round on BBC 1's Pop Quiz.

Pulp’s years lurking in the backwaters could now be seen as advantageous, their own prolonged version of the way The Beatles had honed their craft hidden away in Hamburg. If Britpop was about taking age-old strands of British culture and re-styling them for the contemporary era, Pulp were masters of the moment. The Sheffield years weren't far removed from the formative grind endured by any traditional Northern stand-up comedian.

Russel: ‘On stage, Jarvis is always great at talking to people. But before Britpop, he kind of had them in his hand and then turned it into a joke. That used to drive me mad because I wanted him to keep hold of them and make it all really euphoric. Coming into the 90s he became a full-on master of ceremonies and it was great. The Pulp shows in that period was so exciting. That was the best of it for me. I don't think we ever truly captured it on record.’

When Pulp stood in for an injury-stricken Stone Roses at Glastonbury in 1995, they were greeted with the kind of open-armed gratitude Allied troops experienced while liberating Paris in 1944. These latter-day saviours brought with them a whiff of sex and nylons, but also Common People, a song that for the summer of 1995 became a universal anthem to match Lily Marlene or The White Cliffs of Dover.

When Jarvis guest presented Top of the Pops in 1994, he was met with a wave of communal good will. Even more so than when Chris U band appeared two years later, gamey lisping through ‘Suggs at six with Cecilia.’ Then Pulp became Top of the Pops themselves, their Different Class album hitting Number 1. It wasn't difficult to account for its success. The likes of Mis-Shapes and Something Changed have show-tune vigour that could have been as successful for Tommy Steele or Jesus Christ Superstar. There were also more left field inclinations. Common People was partly inspired by the drones of American minimalist composers Steve Reich and La Monte Young. But at its core, the album dealt in ancient methodology: narrative writing set to music everyone could understand.

While Britpop groups occasionally mined British music hall, Pulp surveyed the eternal verities of popular song less self-consciously than their peers. Here was a new folk music, but one that always felt like pop music. Musically, the album touched on The Beatles’ Revolution 9, drum and bass, the soundtrack to 1966 French film Un Homme et une Femme by Claude Lelouch and Gloria the 1982 hit from Laura Branigan. It amounted to a remarkable piece of populist art. However, the band have mixed memories of this period.

‘It did feel like vindication,’ says Nick Banks. ‘We were always confident that if only the masses could hear what we were doing, then they'd like it. When people did hear it, quite a few thought it was good enough to shell out for a record or two.’

‘At the time,’ says Candida Doyle, ‘We fought against the Britpop label. I thought we were the best band and there was no way we should be grouped with these other bands, but looking back, we were part of it and I'm glad we were. It was only in 2000 that I actually began to enjoy playing with the band. Before that, I was petrified on stage. Headlining Glastonbury, that was really fucking scary. But when we played Common People and they turned the lights on the crowd singing for miles into the distance, I'll never forget that.’

Russell has a more challenging version of events. ‘It had become a travesty,’ he says. Different Class was a kind of last gasp. It was over by then, but we still managed to get it down as a document. I rather hated Jarvis when he was in the studio singing Common People. He'd become so far removed. He was the villain of the piece because he was wearing trousers he'd been given by some designer. He wasn't wearing his jumble sale trousers. We were surrounded by coked-up knobheads.’

Senior also talks about an attitudinal North-South divide in the band at this point. In the Southern corner were London residents Jarvis and Steve. For the North, Russell, Nick and Candida, (though Candida was actually living in London by this point.) It's a perspective partly shared by Nick. ‘There was a North-South divide,’ says Russell, ‘Abso-fucking-lutely. I like living in Sheffield and one does have a chip on one’s shoulder about being patronised by poncy Southern bastards. To find there was a couple of members of the band who were doing the patronising was rather irksome! (laughs) The more they go all Kate Moss and London, the more I'd be, ‘By heck, where's me whippet?’ There was definitely a divide within the band.’

Russell left Pulp as they began to work on what would become 1998’s This is Hardcore album. By this time narcotics had become part of the picture, appearing in the lyrics of This is Hardcore and becoming a staple topic in Pulp interviews.

‘I thought that was a distorted image,’ says Steve Mackey. ‘I've never known Jarvis have a problem with narcotics. Ever. I was taking a lot more drugs than he was, but I didn't think I was taking that many. With Pulp no one ever went to rehab, no one was taking heroin. I don't recall Jarvis ever regularly taking drugs. But it did become a fairly regular part of the studio experience during This is Hardcore, and that's a dangerous thing. It became a bit of a self-indulgent record. But in a way that's also its finest hour, because something glorious came out of that. I feel very affectionate about that record. I think we really reached something with that.’

And the alleged north-south divide?

‘I never felt that,’ says Mackey, ‘My recollection of why Russell left is that after Different Class, it was clear he wanted to make a record that followed on in that vein. Me and Jarvis made it clear we weren't going to make that kind of record. Russell made it clear he didn't want to make our kind of record. The split was pretty amicable - we didn't fall out, but it cast a shadow over the band. I missed Russell - he was the person I loved watching when I saw them live before I joined.’

Before Pulp played their last show in 2002, they made one more album, the nature oriented We Love Life, released in 2001. There was also an underperforming greatest hits compilation in 2002, a record Jarvis has described as ‘the real whimper, the real silent fart’ of Pulp’s career. It charted Number 71, then disappeared. But if Pulp’s last years can read as forlorn times, that wasn't really the case. Recorded with Scott Walker, We Love Life has some of Pulp’s finest material, particularly the wonderfully elegiac, spoken word piece, Wickerman.

Nowadays, Pulp’s ex-members have a healthy view on all the past dramas, perhaps because Pulp isn't the only thing in their lives anymore. Jarvis was unavailable for interview because he was in America mastering his second solo LP. He also guest-edited BBC Radio 4’s Today programme and collaborated with Nancy Sinatra and Marianne Faithful. I spoke to Candida Doyle as she was visiting Disneyland Paris with six Shetland cousins and their ten children. She’s started a counselling course in London. Steve Mackey just finished producing Florence and the Machine’s debut album. He's produced and co-written for MIA and has remixed the likes of Kelis and Arcade Fire. While overseeing London's Frieze Art Fair’s musical programme, Mackey booked Karlheinz Stockhausen for one of his last engagements before he died. Nick Banks plays at private parties with The Big Shambles, knocking out covers of songs by The Damned, David Bowie and Amy Whitehouse. More typically, he runs Banks' pottery, a Rotherham based crockery business – ‘Crock’n’roll, as we like to call it.’

Of all the former members, Russell Senior has strayed furthest from music. He's written 50,000 words of a debut novel and has been setting up a ‘wild-foods processing plant.’ An avid lover of wild mushrooms, Russell has been furthering this. Rather than reducing trees to a pulp, he's utilised woodland in a more sustainable manner. ‘What I've been doing,’ he says, ‘is drilling little holes in Birch trees to collect sap – I’d highly recommend it.”

Scans from PulpWiki

#russell senior #jarvis cocker #steve mackey #candida doyle #nick banks #mark webber #pulp #britpop #90s #interview

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ongolecharles · 6 months ago

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WORLD'S MOST PEACEFUL NATIONS

Where does your country stand?

Rank Country

---- -------

1 🇮🇸 Iceland

2 🇮🇪 Ireland

3 🇦🇹 Austria

4 🇳🇿 New Zealand

5 🇸🇬 Singapore

6 🇨🇭 Switzerland

7 🇵🇹 Portugal

8 🇩🇰 Denmark

9 🇸🇮 Slovenia

10 🇲🇾Malaysia

11 🇨🇦 Canada

12 🇨🇿 Czech Republic

13 🇫🇮 Finland

14 🇭�� Hungary

15 🇭🇷 Croatia

16 🇧🇪 Belgium

17 🇯🇵 Japan

18 🇳🇱Netherlands

19 🇦🇺 Australia

20 🇩🇪Germany

21 🇧🇹 Bhutan

22 🇲🇺 Mauritius

23 🇪🇸 Spain

24 🇪🇪 Estonia

25 🇰🇼 Kuwait

26 🇧🇬 Bulgaria

27 🇸🇰 Slovak Republic

28 🇳🇴 Norway

29 🇶🇦 Qatar

30 🇱🇻 Latvia

31 🇱🇹Lithuania

32 🇵🇱 Poland

33 🇮🇹 Italy

34 🇬🇧United Kingdom

35 🇲🇪Montenegro

36 🇷🇴Romania

37 🇴🇲 Oman

38 🇲🇰North Macedonia

39 🇸🇪 Sweden

40 🇬🇷 Greece

41 🇻🇳 Vietnam

42 🇦🇱 Albania

43 🇹🇼 Taiwan

44 🇲🇬Madagascar

45 🇲🇳Mongolia

46 🇰🇷South Korea

47 🇦🇷Argentina

48 🇮🇩Indonesia

49 🇱🇦Lao P.D.R.

50 🇧🇼Botswana

51 🇹🇱Timor-Leste

52 🇺🇾Uruguay

53 🇦🇪United Arab Emirates

54 🇷🇸 Serbia

55 🇬🇭 Ghana

56 🇽🇰 Kosovo

57 🇿🇲 Zambia

58 🇨🇷 Costa Rica

59 🇰🇿Kazakhstan

60 🇺🇿Uzbekistan

61 🇧🇦 Bosnia and Herzegovina

62 🇳🇦 Namibia

63 🇲🇩 Moldova

64 🇨🇱 Chile

65 🇹🇿Tanzania

66 🇸🇱 Sierra Leone

67 🇯🇴 Jordan

68 🇧🇴 Bolivia

69 🇱🇷 Liberia

70 🇰🇭Cambodia

71 🇹🇯Tajikistan

72 🇦🇴 Angola

73 🇵🇾Paraguay

73 🇹🇳 Tunisia

75 🇹🇭 Thailand

76 🇦🇲 Armenia

77 🇰🇬 Kyrgyz Republic

78 🇲🇦 Morocco

79 🇲🇼 Malawi

80 🇳🇵Nepal

81 🇧🇭 Bahrain

82 🇬🇲The Gambia

82 🇹🇲Turkmenistan

84 🇸🇳 Senegal

85 🇬🇼Guinea-Bissau

86 🇫🇷 France

87 🇹🇹Trinidad and Tobago

88 🇨🇳 China

88 🇨🇾Cyprus

90 🇩🇿 Algeria

91 🇯🇲Jamaica

92 🇷🇼 Rwanda

93 🇧🇩Bangladesh

94 🇬🇶Equatorial Guinea

95 🇲🇷Mauritania

96 🇵🇦 Panama

97 🇩🇴Dominican Republic

98 🇨🇺 Cuba

99 🇵🇪 Peru

100 🇬🇪Georgia

100 🇱🇰Sri Lanka

102 🇸🇦Saudi Arabia

103 🇸🇿Eswatini

104 🇵🇭Philippines

105 🇪🇬Egypt

106 🇦🇿Azerbaijan

107 🇸🇻El Salvador

107 🇲🇿Mozambique

109 🇨🇮Côte d’Ivoire

110 🇨🇬Republic of the Congo

111 🇬🇾Guyana

112 🇧🇾Belarus

113 🇳🇮Nicaragua

114 🇧🇯 Benin

115 🇵🇬Papua New Guinea

116 🇮🇳 India

117 🇬🇹Guatemala

118 🇬🇦 Gabon

119 🇩🇯Djibouti

120 🇹🇬T ogo

121 🇬🇲Zimbabwe

122 🇰🇪Kenya

123 🇭🇳Honduras

124 🇬🇳 Guinea

125 🇱🇸Lesotho

126 🇺🇬Uganda

127 🇿🇦 South Africa

128 🇱🇾 Libya

129 🇧🇮Burundi

130 🇪🇨Ecuador

131 🇧🇷Brazil

132 🇺🇸United States

133 🇮🇷 Iran

134 🇱🇧Lebanon

135 🇹🇩 Chad

136 🇪🇷 Eritrea

137 🇨🇲Cameroon

138 🇲🇽Mexico

139 🇹🇷Türkiye

140 🇵🇰Pakistan

141 🇳🇪Niger

142 🇻🇪Venezuela

143 🇭🇹 Haiti

144 🇪🇹Ethiopia

145 🇵🇸Palestine

146 🇨🇴Colombia

147 🇳🇬Nigeria

148 🇲🇲Myanmar

149 🇻🇺Burkina Faso

150 🇨🇫Central African Republic

151 🇮🇶Iraq

152 🇰🇵North Korea

153 🇸🇴Somalia

154 🇲🇱Mali

155 🇮🇱 Israel

156 🇸🇾 Syria

157 🇷🇺 Russia

158 🇨🇩Democratic Republic of the Congo

159 🇺🇦Ukraine

160 🇦🇫Afghanistan

161 🇸🇸South Sudan

162 🇸🇩 Sudan

163 🇾🇪 Yemen

But what's the TRUE PEACE??

Only JESUS is the true PEACE ...

● "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid." ... John 44:27

● "If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all." ... Romans 12:18

【Build your Faith in Christ Jesus on #dailyscripturereadingsgroup 📚: +256 751 540 524 .. Whatsapp】

***

Source: Global Peace Index 2024.

#climate change #astronomy #astrophotography #biology #book quotes #inspirational quotes #marine biology #nasa #relatable quotes #romance quotes

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mariacallous · 7 months ago

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After symbolically holding a Republika Srpska government meeting in the town of Srebrenica on Thursday ahead of the UN General Assembly vote on the genocide resolution, Bosnian Serb political leaders announced a plan for what they called “peaceful separation”.

Milorad Dodik, president of Republika Srpska, said after the meeting that the Serb-dominated entity should separate from the Bosniak- and Croat-dominated Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina entity.

Dodik said that it was impossible for Serbs to continue living “with those who violate the Dayton agreement”, the peace deal that ended Bosnia’s 1992-95 war.

He added that the Republika Srpska government will create a “peaceful separation agreement”, which will be sent to the Federation entity.

Bosnian Serbs and their political partners, particularly in Serbia, have been strongly campaigning against the UN General Assembly resolution, claiming it would “demonise” all Serbs.

The resolution, proposed by Germany and Rwanda, intends to declare July 11 the International Day of Remembrance for the 1995 Srebrenica genocide.

It will state that the UN unreservedly condemns any denial of the genocide in Srebrenica, and call on member states to ensure that court-established facts are taught in their educational systems.

But it only accuses individuals of bearing responsibility for the Srebrenica genocide, not states or ethnic groups.

Dodik also said that the Republika Srpska government, together with local authorities, will form a commission tasked with establishing a date to be annually commemorated as “the day of the victims of Srebrenica”, taking into account both Bosniak and Serb victims.

Republika Srpska Prime Minister Radovan Viskovic incorrectly claimed the UN resolution describes Serbs as a “genocidal people” and compares the victims of Srebrenica victims to those of Auschwitz and the Jasenovac and Donja Gradina concentration camps in Croatia during World War II.

Viskovic also disputed the number of genocide victims in Srebrenica, claiming without factual backup that some of those who were “buried are alive”

“According to all that has been said in scientific and expert circles, a severe crime happened in Srebrenica, and we accept that. All those who committed crimes should be held accountable. What about the 3,500 victims of Serbian nationality in and around Srebrenica?” Viskovic asked.

In July 1995, more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were killed in massacres by Bosnian Serb forces. In 2007, the International Court of Justice in The Hague characterised the crimes committed against Bosniaks from Srebrenica in 1995 as genocide.

Bosnian Serb wartime political and military leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic have both been sentenced to life imprisonment for genocide by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia.

A total of 49 individuals have also been sentenced to more than 700 years in prison by courts in The Hague, Sarajevo and Belgrade for involvement in crimes related to the Srebrenica massacres.

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aristotels · 1 year ago

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btw fun fact: the biggest EU baklava factory is in fact based in croatia

(tho its a british company.........very curious abt this outsorcing) (95% of the product is exported btw) (wondering if they pay workers less than they would british ones?)

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beardedmrbean · 9 months ago

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The Balkan country of Bosnia and Herzegovina is to begin EU membership negotiations, eight years after it formally applied to join the bloc.

The European Commission - the EU's executive arm - last week recommended that talks should begin.

EU leaders have now given the plan their approval.

European Council president Charles Michel congratulated the country's leaders, telling them: "Your place is in our European family."

He posted a photo of him shaking hands with Borjana Krišto, Chairwoman of the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

"Today's decision is a key step forward on your EU path. Now the hard work needs to continue so Bosnia and Herzegovina steadily advances, as your people want."

Shortly afterward, Ms Krišto expressed her thanks, saying: "Mutual determination and effort have resulted in achieving the necessary level of compliance with the requirements and criteria."

Germany's chancellor, Olaf Scholz, described the thumbs-up for Bosnia as a "good message" for the entire region.

Croatia's prime minister Andrej Plenković said it was "a historic day for our neighbouring and friendly Bosnia and Herzegovina!"

EU to open membership talks with Ukraine

Is Europe doing enough to help Ukraine?

Bosnia has been waiting a long time to receive the green light for talks.

In 2003, the EU produced the Thessaloniki Declaration, saying they wanted Western Balkan countries to join them. Since then, only Croatia has completed the complex accession process.

After applying for membership in 2016, Bosnia was granted candidate status in October 2022.

Over the past year, it has been passing laws relating to priorities set out by the Commission that focus on democracy and the functioning of the state, the rule of law, fundamental rights and reform of public administration.

Some of these laws include clamping down on money laundering, conflicts of interest, and even approving negotiations on an agreement with EU border agency Frontex.

Bosnia is still ethnically and politically divided, even decades after the 1992-95 war that tore the country apart, leaving more than 100,000 people dead and millions displaced.

It could be many more years until the country formally joins the EU, as they would be required to implement more economic and democratic reforms.

Albania, Georgia, Kosovo, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine have all applied to join the bloc and are at various stages of the application process.

The war in Ukraine has sharpened the EU's awareness that it needs to show commitment to the Western Balkans.

#nunyas news

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certainwoman · 1 year ago

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Perhaps you could go on the street and call for the abolition of the Croatian state and a right of return for the literal hundreds of thousands of Serbs removed from Croatia. Were Serbian depopulated villages not settled by Croats after 95 with state support? Perhaps a democratic merge with Serbia? Why are these not acceptable solutions to you?

Dude i would love to have yugoslavia back. Who said those are not acceptable solutions to me?

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exyusimp · 1 year ago

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Oh to be Danielja wiping makeup off and Sanja thrusting in one of the most iconic Croatian anthems

#ex yu #yugoslavia #jugoslavija #jugoton #eurovision #esc yugoslavia #esc 87 #novi fosili #Sanja dolezal #esc Croatia #esc 95 #magazin #esc 98 #danielja martinovic #80s #90s #croatia

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djuvlipen · 2 years ago

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HMDT Blog: Roma survivors from former Yugoslavia

18 June 2015

During this year’s Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month, historian Rainer Schulze reminds us of the systematic persecution the Roma and Sinti suffered during the period of Nazi rule in Germany and in Nazi-occupied Europe.

Rainer is Professor of Modern European History at the University of Essex and the programmer of the University of Essex’s annual Holocaust Memorial Week. In today’s blog, Rainer introduces us to two Roma survivors of the persecution in former Yugoslavia during the Second World War.

Around 15 years ago, the poet and human rights activist Paul Polansky interviewed Roma who lived through the Second World War in various parts of former Yugoslavia. These oral histories document the diversity of the Roma experience of oppression and persecution in south-eastern Europe during this period.

One of those interviewed was Katica Djurdjevich. She was born in 1921 in the small Croatian village of Viri into a Lovari Roma family. She grew up in the traditional Lovari way. Her father travelled with a horse and a wagon through the neighbouring villages selling bits of household goods and helping out on the fields, while her mother was a fortune-teller. Katica married very young and quickly had two children. Her husband Milan Shain was a Kalderash Rom, and she moved to Pitomača in northern Croatia to join his family, where she supported the family’s income by fortune-telling – a skill she had picked up from her mother and her grandmother.

While most Roma in rural Croatia had always been poor and lacked access to education, it was only when the war came to Yugoslavia in 1941, and the Ustaše puppet state of Croatia was set up, that they were subjected to violence and abuse. Ustaše men roamed the countryside forcing Roma to work in the fields. Many Roma women were raped. One night the Ustaše rounded up the Roma of Pitomača and made them play and dance for cheap thrills. Katica remembered being hidden on several occasions by her husband when Ustaše men forcibly entered their house. She was constantly living in fear.

The first to be taken away were Katica’s family in Viri. They were deported to Jasenovac concentration camp where they were murdered. Katica’s husband and uncle were selected for forced labour in Germany because of their physical strength. Then one night towards the end of the war, Katica, her two small children and the remaining members of her husband’s family were also rounded up, put on cattle cars and transported to Jasenovac.

When they reached the camp after eight days, they were informed that they could go home again. Orders had changed and, as ‘non-nomadic Gypsies’, they would no longer be incarcerated. They were sent back to Pitomača in the same cattle cars, but when they arrived they found their houses looted, broken or burnt down by the Ustaše.

Katica’s husband eventually returned home after the end of the war, but there was never any compensation for the forced labour he had to do in Germany, for the persecution the rest of the family suffered in Croatia, or for their loss of property. In fact, almost 50 years later, during the Croatian War of Independence 1991-95, the old fears of the Ustaše returned: ‘The Ustaše Croats hate us: they hate us only because we are Roma.’

Remzedin Durmishevich was born in 1923 in Niš, southern Serbia where his family lived in the Roma neighbourhood. His father worked in the railway workshop, his mother stayed at home raising the four children. When the German army occupied Serbia in 1941, most Roma men from Niš were taken to Crveni Krst concentration camp, where some of them were murdered, while others, including Remzedin, were made to work for the Germans. They had to wear yellow armbands identifying them as Roma.

In 1942, Remzedin was deported to Germany for forced labour, together with his 14-year-old brother, and was made to work in a factory in Osnabrück, north-west Germany. He managed to escape in 1943 with a forged vacation pass and secretly returned to Niš where he found his mother and remaining brother and sister hiding in the ruins of the old Roma settlement. Remzedin joined the communist Partisans fighting against both German troops and the Serbian nationalist Četnik militias. He felt the Partisans did not discriminate against Roma and did not use the term ‘Gypsy’.

Remzedin returned to Niš in 1946 and found a job at the same railway workshop where his father worked. Many of the Roma population of Niš had returned, but life was harsh: ‘Serbs did not want us because we were ‘Roma’.’

These stories show the different ways the Roma were brutalised during the period of the World War Two but, perhaps even more disturbingly, they also point to the continuities of Roma discrimination and anti-Roma racism from the period before the war to the post-war period, right through to the present day.

Read the other blogs in Rainer’s series for Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month:

The life of Sinto boxer Johann ‘Rukeli’ Trollmann

Auschwitz-Birkenau’s Gypsy Family Camp

Auschwitz-Birkenau’s Roma survivors

Persecution of Roma varied across east and south-east Europe

Roma survivors from former Yugoslavia

The Roma community’s long battle for public recognition

Settela’s story

How should we remember the Nazis’ Roma victims?

Photo credit: Copyright Paul Polansky/Kosovo Roma Refugee Foundation, Niš, Serbia.

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