A Comm for Historymemes

On 1 May 1985, Đorđe Martinović, a 56-year-old resident of the Kosovar town of Gjilan, arrived at the local hospital with a broken bottle wedged in his rectum. He claimed that he had been attacked by two Albanianmen while he was working in his field. After being interrogated by a Yugoslav People's Army colonel, Martinović reportedly admitted that his injuries had been self-inflicted in a botched attempt at masturbation.

The "Martinović affair", as it became known, turned into a cause célèbre in Yugoslav politics. Although the facts of the incident remained in dispute for years afterwards, it played a role in worsening ethnic tensions between Kosovo's Serb and Albanianpopulations.