legal theorist Boris Furlan, and the architect Viktor Sulčič. World War II war crimes During World War II Italy attacked Yugoslavia, and occupied large portions of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Serbia and Macedonia, directly annexing Ljubljana Province, Gorski Kotar and Central Dalmatia along with most Croatian islands. In Dalmatia the Italian government made stringent efforts to Italianize the region. Italian occupying forces were accused of committing war crimes in order to transform occupied territories into ethnic Italian territories. The Italian government sent tens-of-thousands of Slavic citizens, among them many women and children, to Italian concentration camps, such as Rab concentration camp, Gonars, Monigo, Renicci, Molat, Zlarin, Mamula, etc. From Ljubljana Province alone, historians estimate the Italians sent 25,000 to 40,000 Slovenes to concentration camps, which represents 8-12% of the total population. Thousands died in the camps, including hundreds of children. Survivors received no compensation from Italy after the war. Mario Roatta was the commander of the Italian 2nd Army in Yugoslavia. To suppress the mounting resistance led by the Slovene and Croat partisans, he adopted tactics of "summary executions, hostage-taking, reprisals, internments and the burning of houses and villages." After the war the Yugoslav government sought unsuccessfully to have him extradited for war crimes from Spain, where he was protected by Francisco Franco. Mario Robotti issued an order in line with a directive received from Mussolini in June 1942: "I would not be opposed to all (sic) Slovenes being imprisoned and replaced by Italians. In other words, we should take steps to ensure that political and ethnic frontiers coincide." Ionian Islands The cultural remnants of the Venetian period were Mussolini's pretext to incorporate the Ionian Islands into the Kingdom of Italy. Even before the outbreak of World War II and the Greek-Italian 1940-1941 Winter War, Mussolini had expressed his wish to annex the Ionian Islands as an Italian province. After the fall of Greece in early April 1941, the Italians occupied much of the country, including the Ionians. Mussolini informed General Carlo Geloso that the Ionian Islands would form a separate Italian province through a de facto annexation, but the Germans would not approve it. Nevertheless, the Italian authorities continued to prepare the ground for the annexation. Finally, on 22 April 1941, after discussions between the German and Italian rulers, Hitler agreed that Italy could proceed with a de facto annexation of the islands. Thus on 10 August 1941 the