Post-War Pathways of Foreign Fighters from the Croatian War (1991--1995) Dataset

This dataset is a part of project 798392 - MPP funded by Marie-Sklodowska Curie Actions Individual Fellowship, a scholarly grant awarded by the European Commission to Dr Milos Popovic as the principal investigator(PI). In total, the dataset includes information on 25 individuals who fought in the Croatian war (1991–1995)as foreign volunteers based on in-person interviews conducted between August 2020 and August 2021 in Croatia and online. It is by no means the universe of cases or a representative sample. The overarching aim of this research is to collect war memories for scientific and archival purposes. All the interviews were set up and carried out by Tomislav Šulj a historian at the Croatian Homeland War Memorial Documentation Centre (https://centardomovinskograta.hr/). The interviewer adhered to a code of conduct approved by Leiden University and the European Commission. First, any participation in the interview was completely voluntary and the participants had the right to refuse participation or any question at any stage or withdraw at any time without any consequence whatsoever while preserving their anonymity. Second, potential interviewees were given a detailed study guidebook beforehand, including the description, aim and anonymity/confidentiality clauses. Third, the interviewees were asked to sign their consent to the use of interview data for scientific purposes, including the production of this dataset. Interviewees were also informed that their anonymity would be broken only under extraordinary circumstances when there is a serious risk of harm or danger to either the interviewer, interviewee or another individual (e.g. physical, emotional or sexual abuse, concerns for child protection, rape, self-harm, suicidal intent or criminal activity) or if a crime was committed. All the conversations were audio-recorded upon the interviewee’s explicit consent. Every signed consent form was scanned and placed together with Dr Popovic’s original audio recording of the interview. There are two copies of the interview notes and audio recordings. One copy is stored in an encrypted folder on Dr Popovic’s personal and office computer at the Institute of Security and Global Affairs in the Hague until after Dr Popovic’s project has ended on September 1, 2021. The second copy is stored and archived at the CroatianHomeland War Memorial Documentation Centre and, following the authorization of the interview transcript, used for research on the Croatian Homeland War. Under the provisions of the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (GDPR), every interviewee is entitled to access the information they have provided at any time.