| 00:00:09 – 00:00:12 | QUOTE |
And now the, er, the bullet goes to the barrel, and you can shoot it. When you, when you press the... see.
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| 00:00:19 – 00:00:30 | VOICE OVER |
Here in the armory of the Croatian police in Zagreb lie hundreds of seized firearms. A fraction of the total stock in the country. Ballistic expert Damir Tomasek looks after the collection.
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| 00:00:31 – 00:00:33 | JOURNALIST: |
What kind of weapons do you store over here?
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| 00:00:34 – 00:01:02 | Damir Tomasek, Ballistics Expert: |
These weapons are originally from the criminal circuit or we received them from the special committee of Home Affairs. Criminals rarely use weapons with a long barrel. They would rather have weapons that you can fire many bullets with in a short time. So automatic revolvers and pistols.
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| 00:01:04 – 00:01:28 | MARIN Dešković, Journalist: |
In this parking lot a dealer was arrested by the police in 2002. He came from Rotterdam with two kilos of cocaine. It was someone who also dealt in weapons. There were dozens of guns found in Rotterdam coming from the city of Karlovac. Theo van Gogh was also murdered with one of these weapons.
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| 00:01:28 – 00:01:38 | VOICE OVER: |
Marin Deskovic is an investigative journalist for the largest newspaper in Croatia. For years he has researched organized crime, with a special focus on weapons.
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| 00:01:38 – 00:01:47 | QUOTE MARIN Dešković |
There are definitely more of those weapons here than in the rest of Europe. That's simply because 20 years ago a war raged here.
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| 00:01:48 – 00:02:06 | VOICE OVER |
In the early 90s, a war broke out in Yugoslavia and a weapons embargo was set by the UN. No one was allowed to sell weapons to the Balkans. At that time Croatia was not officially a country, with no army and nothing to fight with. So they had to think of other ways to arm themselves. |
| 00:02:07 – 00:02:33 | QUOTE MARIN Dešković |
Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia-Herzegovina were trying to get weapons from the black market to arm their new army. At the same time civilians were trying to get weapons in various ways. Whole armies were whipped up and providing themselves with weapons.
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| 00:02:33 – 00:02:43 | VOICE OVER |
But the black market was not sufficient. Much more was needed. The weapon factories were working overtime and creating other small, illegal factories across the country.
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| 00:02:44 – 00:02:53 | QUOTE Damir Tomasek |
Here are some of the weapons that were made in Croatia. That happened in private workshops.
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| 00:02:56 – 00:03:05 | Voice Over: |
Zagorje, a hilly area a half hour drive from the capital Zagreb. During the war many weapons were made in houses and barns here.
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| 00:03:13- 03:03:25 | QUOTE PEOPLE AROUND TABLE |
He is joking - We have enough for one more war. (laughs) We could, we could easily arm one small unit.
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| 00:03:26 – 00:03:37
| VOICE OVER |
The area has a long tradition of weapons. The pride of the people of Zagorje: the Kubura. Once used for hunting, now for weddings, funerals and other milestones.
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| 00:03:39 – 00:03:46 | QUOTE MAN shooting club |
You press it firmly so that the resistance is bigger. Then you get a louder bang.
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| 00:03:49 – 00:03:55 | VOICE OVER |
At this nearby shooting club, locals practice the art of the Kubura, fine tuning their shooting skills.
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| 00:03:57 – 00:04:18 | QUOTE MAN shooting |
We have a wooden gun with an iron barrel. The caliber is 60 millimeters. Now it is loaded. You will put the fine powder in first. And then there is a loud bang, like a thunderclap.
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| 00:04:28 – 00:04:39 | VOICE OVER |
Nowadays the Kubura is only allowed to be made in a few workshops in Zagorje. But during the war the art of gunsmiths in the area was used to produce weapons for battle.
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| 00:04:40 – 00:04:43 | JOURNALIST |
How did they do in those small factories?
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| 00:04:44 – 00:05:03 | QUOTE Damir Tomasek |
The weapons were manufactured from start to finish in workshops. From a piece of metal, forms of these dimensions were cut. And through finer shaping they achieved results as you see here. These are the various steps in the process.
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| 00:05:05 – 00:05:16 | VOICE OVER |
But the production of those weapons didn’t stop after the civil war. Research by Interpol shows that producers in Zagorje switched to making weapons that were ending up in the hands of European criminals.
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| 00:05:18 – 00:05:34 | QUOTE MARIN Dešković |
Short machine guns, replicas of mini-Uzis, but of lesser quality, were sold to criminals on the black market. Mainly in Western Europe, and a portion would have gone to South America.
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| 00:05:34 – 00:05:54 | QUOTE Damir Tomasek |
This weapon would be very popular with criminals because it is difficult to trace. No special features, no serial number. In an investigation there is nothing to hold on to, not any ground on which it can further be traced.
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| 00:05:54 – 00:06:09 | VOICE OVER |
According to the Interpol investigation, secret workshops exist in dozens of villages in Zagorje, where among other automatic weapons, pistols and silencers are made. The Croatian police only took action three years after the warning from Interpol.
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| 00:06:11 – 00:06:25 | QUOTE Mihael sprajc |
In the last six or seven years the Croatian Criminal Investigation Department has done a number of studies, after which dozens of people were arrested and several illegal workshops were shut down.
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| 00:06:27 – 00:06:29 |
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SHOTS
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| 00:06:29 – 00:06:41 | VOICE OVER |
The members of the shooting club in Zagorje like to talk about their passion for Kubura. But when it comes to other weapons that many people keep illegally at home here, they keep their mouths shut - even after a few glasses of wine.
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| 00:06:47 – 00:06:56 | QUOTE PEOPLE AROUND TABLE | We don't even hear that somebody still has guns. The wise people still have them hidden. |
| 00:06:58 – 00:07:12 | VOICE OVER |
The people of the Balkans were heavily armed after the civil war. To take all these weapons out of circulation, the UN immediately started large collection campaigns after a peace treaty was signed. But not everyone wanted to hand in their gun voluntarily.
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| 00:07:13 – 00:07:29 | QUOTE MARIN Dešković |
These weapons are a relic of the war. People have different reasons not to relinquish them. Some are afraid that they might need them again if another war breaks out.
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| 00:07:31 – 00:07:39 | VOICE OVER |
The local police insist they want those weapons out of society at all costs. Police chief Mihael Sprajc argues they have been driving major campaigns for years.
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| 00:07:40 – 00:08:00 | QUOTE Mihael sprajc |
A large publicity campaign has been started on TV and radio, at local level, and so on. They explain that it is dangerous to have weapons at home. They may be old weapons and people often cannot handle them.
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| 00:08:01 – 00:08:16 | VOICE OVER |
Although the police are pleased with how many they’ve collected so far, many people just won’t hand in their weapons. One of the reasons is that the police won’t pay for them. Criminals do. A large portion of the people who want to get rid of their weapons therefore prefer to sell to gangs.
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| 00:08:16 – 00:08:25 | QUOTE MARIN Dešković |
The fact that these weapons are so easily available is a great opportunity for criminal organizations that want to buy them.
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| 00:08:27 – 00:08:34 | VOICE OVER |
Afterwards these weapons are sold all over the world. Last year a few French journalists tried to buy themselves a weapon in the Balkans.
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| 00:08:35 – 00:08:51 | JOURNALIST |
How much is it to buy a weapon here in Bosnia?
Four hundred euros each. With two magazines.
And where are they going?
They are going to Germany, France and Belgium.
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| 00:08:52 – 00:09:01 | VOICE OVER |
Petra Bakker is Holland’s police commissioner for the European Union. Together with her EU colleagues, she tries to prevent more weapons coming this way from the Balkans.
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| 00:09:04 – 00:09:37 | QUOTE PETRA BAKkER, EU Police Commissioner, Holland |
What we see is that a lot are going overland in different ways. Sometimes with prepared hiding places but sometimes a weapon lies simply under a chair. It is often not large parties. What we see now are not big heavy organized networks who do that, but loose networks. And what stands out if you look at this weapon trade is that weapons often go through several hands, through groups that also deal with other forms of crime.
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| 00:09:37 – 00:09:45 | VOICE OVER |
That chain is also supported by the research of journalist Marin Deskovic. Weapons that travel to other EU countries are usually exchanged for drugs.
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| 00:09:45 – 00:10:10 | QUOTE MARIN Dešković |
Very simple. They get those weapons in different ways. They are then smuggled to the Netherlands in secret compartments in cars. There they exchange it for synthetic drugs such as ecstasy and amphetamines. These drugs are smuggled back in the same repositories to Croatia and Bosnia and traded there.
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| 00:10:12 – 00:10:25 | VOICE OVER |
Here in the gun safe of the Dutch Forensic Institute are confiscated weapons from Croatia. Although they no longer come in the large numbers they did just after the civil war, the Dutch police are still worried.
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| 00:10:26 – 00:10:45 | QUOTE PETRA BAKER | Such weapons could also get in the hands of confused people or people with radical ideas. And what also is a trend in armed robberies is that sometimes heavier weapons are used that also come from those areas.
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| 00:10:46 – 00:10:54 | VOICE OVER |
As Croatia becomes a member of the EU, European police forces have decided to set their focus more strongly on weapons from the Balkans.
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| 00:10:56 – 00:11:11 | QUOTE PETRA BAKER | Co-operation from Europe is also very important. I expect that with cooperation we will get a better view on the parties involved in weapons smuggling, and we can act against it much earlier through joint action.
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| 00:11:12 – 00:11:24 | VOICE OVER |
How many people in Croatia have an illegal weapon lying in their barn or under their bed? Nobody knows. But as summer holiday season begins, the local police are keen to stress that the country certainly isn’t dangerous.
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| 00:11:24 – 00:11:53 | QUOTE Mihael sprajc |
Croatia is one of the major tourist attractions in Europe. There are over ten million tourists a year in our country. But there are no incidents that are related to weapons. We are known as a safe destination. There are no murders or explosions or other incidents that endanger the safety of tourists.
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| 00:11:53 |
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LOUD POP
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| 00:11:55 – 00:12:10 | VOICE OVER |
These weapons from the Balkans may have been silenced since the war, but they have become a reservoir for European criminals.
As Croatia joins the European Union, the question remains - will their exodus towards the West be any easier to stop?
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