Serbian Guard
Encyclopedia
The Serbian Guard was a Serbia
Serbia
Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...

n paramilitary active in Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...

 during its War of Independence
Croatian War of Independence
The Croatian War of Independence was fought from 1991 to 1995 between forces loyal to the government of Croatia—which had declared independence from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia —and the Serb-controlled Yugoslav People's Army and local Serb forces, with the JNA ending its combat...

 with close ties to the Serbian Renewal Movement
Serbian Renewal Movement
The Serbian Renewal Movement is a political party in Serbia.It was founded in 1990.In 1997 a dissident group abandoned the party and formed New Serbia....

 (SPO). Eighty percent of the guard's members were members of the SPO. The paramilitary was formed by SPO official Vuk Drašković
Vuk Draškovic
Vuk Drašković , leader of the Serbian Renewal Movement, is a Serbian politician who served as the Deputy Prime Minister of Yugoslavia and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of State Union of Serbia and Montenegro and Serbia.He graduated from the University of Belgrade's Law School in 1968...

 and his wife Danica Drašković, along with Đorđe Božović "Giška" and Branislav Matić "Beli".

The paramilitary unit's training camp was located near Bor
Bor, Serbia
Bor is a town and municipality located in eastern Serbia, with one of the largest copper mines in Europe and it has been a mining centre since 1904, when a French company began operations there. It is the administrative center of the Bor District of Serbia...

 Lake in SR Serbia
Socialist Republic of Serbia
Socialist Republic of Serbia was a socialist state that was a constituent country of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. It is a predecessor of modern day Serbia, which served as the biggest republic in the Yugoslav federation and held the largest population of all the Yugoslav...

, SFR Yugoslavia. It participated in clashes on the territory of SR Croatia
Socialist Republic of Croatia
Socialist Republic of Croatia was a sovereign constituent country of the second Yugoslavia. It came to existence during World War II, becoming a socialist state after the war, and was also renamed four times in its existence . It was the second largest republic in Yugoslavia by territory and...

 near the town of Gospić
Gospic
Gospić is a town in the mountainous and sparsely populated region of Lika, Croatia. It is the administrative centre of Lika-Senj county. Gospić is located near the Lika River in the middle of a karst field....

. Elements of the unit also participated in the War in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Đorđe Božović was the unit's first commander, but was killed in action near Gospić. Some people have alleged that Božović's death was an act of "friendly fire" orchestrated by the Republic of Serbian Krajina
Republic of Serbian Krajina
The Republic of Serbian Krajina was a self-proclaimed Serb entity within Croatia. Established in 1991, it was not recognized internationally. It formally existed from 1991 to 1995, having been initiated a year earlier via smaller separatist regions. The name Krajina means "frontier"...

's government. The unit's chief financier Branislav Matić was gunned down in August 1991 in Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...

.

Serbian general Nebojša Pavković
Nebojša Pavkovic
Nebojša Pavković was Chief of the General Staff of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia....

has called for Drašković to be tried for his role in the guard's formation.
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