Dinko Šakić

Who was Dinko Šakić?

Dinko Šakić was a Croatian fascist leader who commanded the Jasenovac concentration camp in the Independent State of Croatia from April–November 1944, during World War II. Born in the village of Studenci, near the town of Ljubuški in what was then the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, he became a member of the fascist Ustaše at a young age. When the Axis powers occupied the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in April 1941, Šakić joined the administration in Jasenovac. He became the camp's assistant commander the following year, and married Nada Luburić, the half-sister of concentration camp commander Vjekoslav Luburić, in 1943. This marriage, as well as his fanatic support for Ustaše leader Ante Pavelić, led to Šakić's appointment as commander of Jasenovac in April 1944. An estimated 2,000 people were killed under his command.

In 1945, Šakić and his wife fled the Balkans alongside other Ustaše officials following the collapse of the NDH and Nazi Germany. They emigrated to Argentina in 1947, where Šakić started a textile business, was an active member of the country's 10,000-strong Croat community, and became friends with Paraguayan dictator Alfredo Stroessner. He lived an otherwise quiet life and made no effort to hide his identity. In 1990, the Feral Tribune interviewed Šakić for a magazine article and published his picture. Šakić met Croatian leader Franjo Tuđman at a reception in Buenos Aires during his visit to Argentina in 1994 and was interviewed by a Croatian publication called Magazin soon afterwards. He stated in the interview that he wished more Serbs had been killed in Jasenovac, saying that he would "do it all again". He added that he "slept like a baby".