Saborsko massacre The Saborsko massacre was a war crime committed during the Croatian War of Independence in Saborsko and two other Croatian villages in the region of Kordun by the Serb - led JNA and rebel Croatian Serbs ' " Militia of Republic of Serb Krajina " in October and November 1991 , in which they killed ethnic Croats residents . Background . An important fact about the JNA was about its leadership , as well as its ethnical structure of troops ( army obligants , reserves , officers ) . Although JNA ( Yugoslav National Army ) wore the name of Yugoslavia , the ethnical structure of JNA ' soldiers engaged was not representing the ethnical structure of Yugoslavia ; it had no army obligants from Croatia and Slovenia , nor Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina , so the share of Serbs became extremely higher . That was because of ending of regular one - year military service - one of " big " classes ended its service at the end of August and the beginning of September , and after the December of 1991 , the recruitmenet percentage from those republics sharply dropped . The class of June had no recruits from Croatian and Slovenia at all . The other important factors , that influenced changed army ' s ethnical structure was the deserting of army during the service ( mostly non - Serb soldiers from Croatia and Croats from Bosnia - Herzegovina ) , higher percentage of relieving from army obligation ( medical and other reasons ) during the service ( much higher than usual ) and various evading steps undertaken before the start of military service . Additionally , reserve forces were recruited from Serbia and Montenegro ( the latter were , however , engaged on southern Croatian battlefield ) . Similar was with army ' s professional personnel ( officers , experts , tehnicians ) . The assault on Saborsko region . According to the census of 1991 , Saborsko had 1 , 701 inhabitants in 460 households . The majority were the autochthonous Croats . Local Serb paramilitaries had started with attacks on Croat villages on October 1 , 1991 , with military support of JNA forces from Knin . Among other attacks , these forces had attacked Saborsko , a small village located some 10 kilometers northwest from Plitvička Jezera . The assault , ICTY sources confirm , was a part of the ethnic cleansing plan . According to that plan , " all Croats and other non - Serbs were to be displaced from there , in order to get ethnically clean Republic of Serbian Krajina " . Ethnically cleansed areas were used as jumpboards for the further assaults on other areas of Croatia . Massacres . On 28 October 1991 , Territorial Defence Forces ( TO ) units killed seven civilians in the village of Lipovača , located east of Saborsko and Rakovica . On 7 November 1991 , the Yugoslav People ' s Army ( JNA ) and Serbian paramilitary units , in particular a special JNA unit from Niš , Serbia , entered the hamlet of Vukovići near Poljanak and executed ten civilians . Poljanak is located southeast of Saborsko but southwest of Rakovica , around 10 km from both Lipovača and Saborsko . On 12 November 1991 , the attackers , consisting of members of " Martić ’ s Police " , the JNA , and the TO , breached the defense lines of the village of Saborsko . After that , they went from house to house and killed peasants ( in total 29 of them ) that had been unable or unwilling to abandon the village . After that , all houses were plundered . A Catholic church was blown up and the local graveyard was devastated by the attackers , presumably to remove all traces of previous Croat inhabitants . Several of the villagers survived by sneaking three days through the forests into Bihać in neighboring Bosnia and Herzegovina , where they were accepted and then transferred to Croatia by buses , where they were given shelter with other refugees in hotels . Altogether , in Saborsko , 29 people were killed in this event . The assailants came from the village of Plaški , located around 10 km northwest of Saborsko .