Mass mortality of Serbian prisoners of war and interned civilians in Austro-Hungarian camps during the First World War 1914-1918

Abstract

This paper discusses the massive use of camps by the Austro-Hungarian Empire during the First World War, 1914-1918, in order to achieve its war aims, being the most prominent country of the Central Powers. The camps were founded for each nation separately. There were at least 300 camps, out of which ten were large. There were captivated Serbian prisoners of war, but unlike other nations, there were also Serbian civilians interned, which was prohibited by Geneva conventions. In these camps, there was a mass mortality of Serbian inmates aged 1 to 101 years. The final number of imprisoned and killed Serbs has not been determined, but it is considered to be much higher than the estimated number accepted at the peace conference in Versailles. From the previous research the main causes of their suffering can be seen. These are hunger, inadequate housing of the inmates, the location of the camps, heavy forced labor, poor hygiene and health care, illness and disease, punishment and looting of detainees, etc. All camps operated by the same principle and achieved the same war results: the mass mortality of the imprisoned people. Given that the camps were massively opened during the Second World War by the same countries, it is clear that from the beginning they were planned and designed as the most efficient means of genocide against the Serbs.