Acts of Courage

REMEMBERING

SREBRENICA

Acts of Courage Dedicated to the victims of the genocide and all those who champion against hate.

On 11 July 1995, fifty years after the Holocaust, genocide occurred again on European soil. On 11 July each year we mark the official Srebrenica day of commemoration. The United Nations, the European Parliament and the UK Government have all called for the international community to commemorate Srebrenica:

“We stand by Bosnia-Herzegovina “We share in the grief of those citizens as they commemorate whose loss can never be and honour the memory of repaired. And we pay homage the citizens lost in the act of to those who died. May their genocide that took place in the souls rest in peace. May we all Bosnian town of Srebrenica. learn, and act on, the lessons This was an act of genocide of Srebrenica.” of a scale unseen in Europe KOFI ANNAN FORMER UN SECRETARY GENERAL for decades, and a tragedy which should never have been allowed to occur. We will never forget these events.”

JOINT STATEMENT BY THE UK & GERMAN GOVERNMENTS

2 Remembering Srebrenica

The European Parliament calls on the Council and the Commission to commemorate appropriately the anniversary of the Srebrenica-PotoÄ?ari act of genocide by supporting Parliament’s recognition of 11 July as the day of commemoration of the Srebrenica genocide all over the EU, and to call on all the countries of the western Balkans to do the same.

The European Parliament urges the development of educational and cultural programmes that promote an understanding of the causes of such atrocities and raise awareness about the need to nurture peace and to promote human rights and interreligious tolerance.

EU RESOLUTION, 9 JULY 2015

EU RESOLUTION, 15 JANUARY 2009

Remembering Srebrenica 3

Contents 6

Voices of Support

Leading politicans, faith leaders and senior figures in the international community explain why the work of Remembering Srebrenica is so vital.

22

The Resisters

Short histories of the conflict.

Survivors share the road to genocide through their eyes. Stories of those who had the courage to resist hatred and division.

4 Remembering Srebrenica

88

Our Impact

The Stories Behind the Statistics As Remembering Srebrenica celebrates its five year anniversary, we reflect on what has been achieved.

Editor Anousheh Haghdadi Deputy Editor Andrew Tromans Art Director Jannah Haque Cover artwork Robert McNeil

This publication has been produced by Remembering Srebrenica (www.srebrenica. org.uk) which is a project of Ummah Help (Registered Charity Number: 1142686). Š Copyright 2018 Ummah Help. All Rights Reserved. Views expressed are those of their respective authors and do not necessarily in any way reflect those of Remembering Srebrenica or Ummah Help. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is strictly prohibited.

Remembering Srebrenica, 2nd Floor, Newland House,137–139 Hagley Road, Birmingham, B16 8UA +44 (0)121 454 3343 www.srebrenica.org.uk Remembering Srebrenica 5

In Memoriam Leading voices from public life on why they support Srebrenica Memorial Day, and how we can work together to build a more courageous society.

6 Remembering Srebrenica

This book is dedicated to the victims of the genocide and all those who champion against hate.

Photo credit: Rooful Ali Remembering Srebrenica 7

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Dr Waqar Azmi OBE CHAIR OF REMEMBERING SREBRENICA

This year marks the 23rd anniversary since over 8000 human beings—mostly Bosnian Muslim men and boys—were murdered in the worst atrocity on European soil since the Second World War. When we commemorate genocide, we focus on the very darkest aspects of human nature. We ask ourselves why. Why do people hate? Why do people rape? Why do people kill? We should also ask: How do people survive? How do people hold hope? How do people resist?

These questions are critical to the prevention of future genocides. Acts of courage in times of war help us to understand how communities may resist regimes that seek to spread fear and division. They sow the

Photo credit: Solihull School

The Chair of Remembering Srebrenica reflects on the lessons that we should draw from the extraordinary bravery of genocide survivors and why courage is needed now more than ever before. seeds of possibility for peace and reconciliation, as these stories are shared from generation to generation.

It is difficult to connect the idea of courage with those dark days in July 1995 when thousands of lives were extinguished within the space of just a few days. The loss of each victim represents a light extinguished from the world: a family ripped apart, a friend lost forever. An old meaning of courage is “to live from the heart”. Genocide, then, is characterised by the absence of courage— by capitulation to fear and by repeated failures to resist the insidious spread of hatred.

What has always been shocking to me about the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina is that, in this extraordinarily vibrant

Above left: Dr Azmi greeting guests at Remembering Srebrenica's 2018 ‘Acts of Courage’ theme launch.

Photo credit: Rooful Ali. Above right: Dr Azmi meeting representatives from the Mothers of Srebrenica.

8 Remembering Srebrenica

VOICES OF SUPPORT

and integrated society, neighbour turned against neighbour. The untold stories here are of those neighbours who refused to turn on each other, who resisted ideologies of hatred and division and who undertook extraordinary acts of courage.

It is those stories that we choose to share and honour with the important theme of ‘Acts of Courage’ this year. The village of Baljvine,

Waqar Azmi meeting with PM Theresa May in Downing Street.

The Chair of Remembering Srebrenica visited President Bakir Izetbegović in January 2018.

where Muslim and Serb villagers made a seemingly impossible choice: friendship over hatred; peace over war. The cellist of Sarajevo, who risked his life to protest the senseless killing of civilians. The members of the Jewish community who helped people in need, no matter who they were.

Across Bosnia-Herzegovina, people from all ethno-national backgrounds made choices to protect and help each other, even at great cost to themselves.

These powerful stories hold important lessons for us here in the UK. 2017 could well be described as a year of fear. Hate in all its forms is on the rise. Terrorist attacks in Manchester and London bred fear, which in turn bred more hate, with the largest recorded increase in hate crimes since reporting began in 2011. The UK is not alone in this regard as extremists of all stripes spread ideologies of hatred and division across Europe and beyond.

However, 2017 was also a year of extraordinary courage. After terrorism and tragedy, communities came together, refusing to let the actions of a small number of individuals divide them. These people responded to fear, not with hate, but with love. 2017 also saw the courage of many to speak out against discrimination, misogyny and harassment across the world. We pay tribute to these powerful voices for truth.

In reflecting and honouring those people who resisted hatred, we should draw some important lessons. The lesson that choice is possible, even in very difficult circumstances.

The lesson that courage is not the absence of fear, but meeting fear with the hope that our common humanity is stronger than manufactured division. Above all, courage is contagious. When one person stands up and speaks out against prejudice and hatred, they inspire others to follow.

It is this courage that unites our community of Champions at Remembering Srebrenica, who are the driving force behind our work here in the UK. Our Champions speak out every day, amplifying survivor voices and sharing lessons from the past.

Remembering Srebrenica 9

Photo credit: Rooful Ali

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Dr Azmi with Lord Bourne, Minister of Faith and parliamentarians from across the political spectrum.

The Chair of Remembering Srebrenica with Community Champions in Birmingham.

They inspire and encourage others to join them in their quest for a society free of hatred. Put simply, our Champions change communities.

In five years of Remembering Srebrenica’s work, our 1,100 Community Champions have brought over 175,000 people from different communities together in almost 5,500 acts of remembrance. It is through our champions that we have educated 75,000 young people on the dangers of hatred and intolerance left unchecked. Through their work, 10 Remembering Srebrenica

millions have learned about what happened in Srebrenica, keeping the memory alive.

These inspirational individuals are not just champions in our communities, but champions for our communities.

None of our work is possible without the unfailing courage of the survivors of the genocide and ethnic cleansing. They are the beating heart of this organisation. Their bravery in speaking the truth about what happened has been extraordinary. Their insistence on seeking justice, rather than revenge, is inspiring. Above all, their dignity in surviving through the very worst of humanity must be honoured by all of us, by: • REMEMBERING the victims of the Srebrenica genocide, as well as all those murdered, persecuted, tortured, subjected to sexual violence and displaced by the genocidal plan of “ethnic cleansing”; • LEARNING lessons from Srebrenica, that without the courage to resist fear of the other, hatred and violence are never far away; and • PLEDGING to act with courage in our everyday lives, by challenging prejudice and intolerance wherever we see it.

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Princess Anne

Photo credit: Doug Peters/Empics Entertainment

Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal represented the United Kingdom at Srebrenica Memorial Day in Potočari to commemorate the genocide which claimed the lives of over 8000 men and boys in the worst atrocity in Europe since World War Two.

The murder of thousands of Muslims, mostly men and boys, at Srebrenica was a terrible crime. The first case of genocide in Europe since the end of the Second World War. It was my honour to represent the people of the United Kingdom at the commemoration in the Potočari graveyard, when my thoughts and prayers were for the victims—those who died, and those

they left behind. The lesson of Srebrenica is that the stirring up of hatred and discrimination is always wrong, and if left unchecked, can lead to terrible evil. So we should all, wherever we live in the world, work for understanding and tolerance between all peoples. That is the message of the ‘Remembering Srebrenica’ initiative, and I commend them for their valuable work.

Remembering Srebrenica 11

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Prime Minister Theresa May The Prime Minister tells us why she supports the work of Remembering Srebrenica and pays tribute to the courage of genocide survivors.

Today we remember the people of Srebrenica; those who lost their lives and those left behind, in what was one of the most unspeakable acts of violence perpetrated in Europe in recent memory. In that July, over 8,000 innocent people were murdered in an act of genocide.

As we remember those who suffered so greatly, we also remember the enduring spirit that shone through even at the darkest points of the violence—the acts of courage that Remembering Srebrenica have chosen as their theme this year. We remember the men and women from all communities who braved sniper fire and landmines to help those in need. We remember those who gave food and shelter to people considered their enemy. We remember all who worked together to build a better Bosnia-Herzegovina after the guns fell silent.

These stories of courage continue to inspire people from across the globe as we reflect on the need to empower individuals to speak out against all forms of hatred and intolerance; to build resilience in our communities; and to inspire hope, not fear.

The British Government’s commitment to peace and stability in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and across the region as a whole, continues today. This commitment is seen in our hosting of the Western Balkans Summit in London 12 Remembering Srebrenica

this July. At the summit, we will work with governments from the region and other international partners to make progress on the economic and security challenges that the Western Balkans continue to face and to help reconciliation efforts.

We do so because we all want to see the region take strides on a path to peace and prosperity, free from conflict. For the greatest act of courage is to ensure that ‘never again’ really means ‘never again’.

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Bakir Izetbegović

Speaking for myself, and on behalf of the Bosnian people, I offer my sincere thanks for pronouncing the truth and guarding the memory of the victims of the Srebrenica genocide. The clear and unequivocal position of the British Government that the genocide should never be forgotten, and that the world needs to be vigilant in preventing similar tragedies in the future, is truly precious to us.

We have valued the support of the British people since 2000. Your government has made significant contribution to the construction of the Memorial Centre in Potočari, the work of the International Commission for Missing Persons, and by actively assisting the returnees to Srebrenica through reconstruction and building of infrastructure. We will remember all this.

“Only brave and sincere leaders can lead the process of exposing the truth... Nobody wants to see conflict again.”

Photo credit: Parsons Photography

Amongst the worst acts of aggression in Europe since WWII, the genocide in Srebrenica was particularly grotesque. President Bakir Izetbegović warns of lurking tensions that need urgent resolution.

From 11th to 16th July 1995, the death squads of Karadžić and Mladić massacred more than 8,000 Bosniaks—only because they were Muslims. Tens of thousands of women and children were forcibly deported.

Prior to that they burnt down 269 Bosniak villages in the region.

Most of the civilized world has, albeit late, called the Srebrenica genocide the biggest crime in Europe since World War II, but in the Republic of Srpska, that truth has not yet been faced. But voices of cynicism are more and more isolated. Even the former president of Serbia, Tomislav Nikolić, known for his radical past, has publicly apologised for the terrible crimes in Srebrenica.

My message is clear: the acknowledgement of truth of the tragic events from the end of the 20th century is a pre-condition to all reconciliation processes and the progress of the Southeast Europe region. Only brave and sincere leaders can lead the process of exposing the truth. Our neighbours, and the whole world, must hear this message and understand it without ambivalence.

Lies, self-deceit, and ignorance are potential sources of renewed violence and conflict.

Everyone needs to take full responsibility for the wrongs done in the name of their people. Nobody wants to see conflict again.

Remembering Srebrenica 13

Voices of Support Rt Hon Nicola Sturgeon MSP First Minister of Scotland

Srebrenica reminds us of the consequences that can arise when prejudice is not challenged and discrimination is not addressed. We all have a part to play in creating a better, more tolerant and more peaceful world and we must celebrate the courage shown by so many during times of conflict throughout the

world by resisting hatred or division and speaking out to address injustice.

The theme ‘Acts of Courage’ serves as a fitting reminder of the importance of everyone in society recognising our shared responsibility to ensure that diversity is celebrated and protected.

Everyone, regardless of their race, faith or nationality, should feel safe and be safe in their own communities.

The Rt Hon Carwyn Jones AM First Minister of Wales

I am pleased to provide a message of support for the Remembering Srebrenica 2018 publication.

It is gratifying to learn that the theme for this year was borne from the words spoken by Hajrudin Mesić, a Srebrenica survivor, whilst at the Srebrenica Commemoration for Wales in 2016.

At the commemoration, Hajrudin said, “I saw how low you can go as a human being, but also incredible acts of courage.”

Twenty-three years on, there is still much that we all need to do to promote tolerance and equality within our communities.

We know all forms of extremism have a damaging 14 Remembering Srebrenica

and corrosive impact, both feeding on and increasing racial and religious tensions.

We must continue to be resilient in the face of anyone spreading bigotry and fear, and strengthen our resolve to become more united whenever we are tested by hate crimes.

It is vital that all people living and working in our communities feel safe and are able to achieve their full potential, unhindered by prejudice or unfair discrimination. Creating a more equal Wales is a central goal for the Welsh Government.

In this work, we can draw inspiration from Hajrudin Mesić, who had the strength to endure his ordeal, but also bore witness to the courage, devotion and humanity shown by ordinary people in the face of violence and terror.

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Colum Eastwood, Arlene Foster, Naomi Long, Michelle O’Neill, Robin Swann The leaders of Northern Ireland’s political parties

We must keep the memory of the victims of Srebrenica alive and work to eliminate prejudice and discrimination. It is important we all learn from the tragedy in Srebrenica in 1995 to help create a safer, better and more hopeful future for everyone. We thank Remembering Srebrenica for their work in helping the

people of Northern Ireland, through commemoration and education, to learn from this genocide in Europe just a generation ago.

We are also determined that our young people learn to shape their future through awareness of the lessons of the past. Srebrenica should be a reminder to us all that reason must not succumb to evil.

It is important that we honour those who lost their lives in the Srebrenica genocide and also those whose lives are still affected by the trauma of

the Bosnian conflict.

We should continue to celebrate the courage of those who work for peace and reconciliation everywhere including in BosniaHerzegovina and here at home.

We condemn prejudice and discrimination wherever and whenever it happens.

We value a diverse, tolerant and interdependent society.

We will do our utmost to make sure that the lessons of Srebrenica are fully learnt so that such devastating violence is never again visited on any community, anywhere.

Naomi Long—Alliance Party

Colum Eastwood—Social Democratic and Labour Party

Michelle O’Neill—Sinn Féin

Arlene Foster—Democratic Unionist Party

Robin Swann MLA—Ulster Unionist Party Remembering Srebrenica 15

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Rt Hon James Brokenshire MP Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government

I am proud that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has been able to support the work of Remembering Srebrenica in all that it has done to commemorate the genocide in Bosnia but also through its work in the United Kingdom.

Courage comes in many forms. Whether that is the courage to speak out against murder and sexual violence, the courage to protect one’s neighbours, the courage of

survivors to give their testimonies. Without these acts of courage, we may never have known the full scale of the atrocities committed 23 years ago.

I would like to send my very best wishes and appreciation to each and everyone one of Remembering Srebrenica’s more than 1,100 Community Champions, from across the country, who bring the lessons learned from Srebrenica closer to home.

Through the inspirational work of the Community Champions, we can make sure that the Srebrenica genocide is never forgotten, that the victims’ memories are honoured and their acts of courage are recognised.

our part in building stronger, more cohesive communities in the UK. As Chairs of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Srebrenica we reach out across party lines and work to ensure the events of July 1995 in Srebrenica are never forgotten.

Against a backdrop of rising reports and incidents of hate crime in the UK, the

work that Remembering Srebrenica does to educate about genocide and the consequences of hatred if left unchallenged, becomes all the more important.

What happened at Srebrenica stands as a caution to all that genocide, ethnic cleansing, and identity-based violence remain an ever-present threat and danger in our world today.

Yasmin Qureshi MP and Rt Hon Andrew Mitchell MP

Co-Chairs of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Srebrenica

The systematic murder of thousands of innocent people at Srebrenica is a terrible warning to the world that when we said ‘never again’ after the Holocaust, we failed to give meaning to those words.

Earlier this year, we both visited Srebrenica to learn how a modern society, like Bosnia-Herzegovina in the 1990s, could tear itself apart. We felt privileged to meet with survivors of the Srebrenica genocide and extremely moved to hear their stories.

We all can draw strength from the courage of the survivors of the Srebrenica genocide who bravely share their testimonies. We should follow their example and play 16 Remembering Srebrenica

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Rt Hon Boris Johnson MP Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs

The horror of the events in Srebrenica has not faded with the passage of 23 years.

During those terrible days in July 1995, over 8,000 civilians—mainly men and boys—were murdered in what can only be described as a calculated act of genocide.

As we mourn those who died, we should reflect on how the most senior perpetrators were eventually held accountable before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Thanks to the courage of the witnesses and

the dogged persistence of many others, justice finally took its course.

Those verdicts will not bring back the thousands who were killed, nor erase the grief of their families, but they should send an emphatic message that no-one who

commits such crimes will be allowed impunity.

Later this year, Britain will host a summit on the Western Balkans. We will do our best to help those who are addressing the legacy of conflict in the region.

Even today, the survivors of wartime sexual violence face an unjustified stigma; the fate of missing persons is still being investigated.

All of this demands bravery and perseverance. So it’s fitting that Remembering Srebrenica’s theme should be “Acts of Courage”. As we work together to guarantee peace in the region, we can draw inspiration from the bravery we celebrate this year.

Rt Hon Emily Thornberry MP Shadow Foreign Minister

In June 1993, he warned that "we are terribly thin I remember the Srebrenica on the ground”, and that Genocide through the eyes “in peacekeeping, without of my father, Cedric, who credibility you are dead.” worked tirelessly on the Despite all his and others’ UN Mission in the former pleadings, there were just a Yugoslavia from early 1992 few hundred Dutch soldiers to early 1994 as Assistantin place in Srebrenica on the Secretary-General of the day the butchers came in 1995, United Nations. who saw the odds against He left deeply angry and them and turned away while fearful about the risks of the the genocide took place. international community That shameful episode leaving the so-called UN ‘safe stands in sharp contrast to areas’ in Bosnia so poorly this year’s Remembering defended against Serbian attack. Srebrenica theme: saluting In October 1992, he and the acts of courage by his colleagues told their ordinary people moved to risk bosses in New York that a their own lives by protecting force of 60,000 troops would those of their neighbours. be needed to defend the This year, their stories will six designated safe areas, inspire us to take hope from including Srebrenica. this tale of despair.

Remembering Srebrenica 17

VOICES OF SUPPORT

The Rt Hon The Baroness Warsi Former Senior Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Srebrenica Memorial Day is a day to stop, to think and to remember the victims of the Srebrenica genocide. I have met with a number of survivors of the Srebrenica genocide, including the Mothers of Srebrenica, women whose sons and husbands were so cruelly taken from them in July 1995. As a wife and a mother, I will be thinking of them in particular on the 11th July.

What happened in Srebrenica carries the message for us all that hatred can take hold of any place, at any time—even at the end of the 20th Century on European soil. With that fact in our minds, and the Mothers of

Srebrenica in our hearts, we must stand together and pledge to make sure this never happens again.

We can all learn lessons from the courage of genocide survivors who carry on and seek justice, whilst courageously sharing their

stories with others so that we can bear witness to one of the darkest periods of history.

It is especially fitting that Remembering Srebrenica’s theme for this year is ‘Acts of Courage’. Remembering Srebrenica plays a vital role in reminding us that it is everyone’s duty to stand up to hatred and speak out against intolerance. Through the work of more than 1,100 dedicated Community Champions across the country, Remembering Srebrenica is helping to build better, safer and stronger communities in the UK. Establishing Remembering Srebrenica, and securing government support for it, was one of my proudest achievements during my time in government and it is a pleasure to continue to support this valuable work.

as Jews, to hear in the testimony of survivors about the wholesale destruction of families, rape, torture and false promises of sanctuary and

to realise that once again, the world was powerless or worse, insufficiently moved to prevent such brazen inhumanity.

Of course, we have a duty to remember those who perished, but the memory of this dark episode alone is not enough. Each one of us can take up the responsibility to honour the victims of this and other genocides by working harder than ever to challenge the ideologies of fear and hatred, wherever they manifest all over the world.

Ephraim Mirvis Chief Rabbi

The world was forced to accept the tragic reality that we had failed to protect more than 8,000 innocent and vulnerable people against the forces of prejudice, hatred and violence. The Srebrenica genocide will forever remain as a permanent stain on our collective European consciousness.

With the Holocaust still casting its long, dark shadow over Europe, it is incredibly painful for us, 18 Remembering Srebrenica

VOICES OF SUPPORT

The Most Rev Justin Welby Archbishop of Canterbury

At a time when we thought Europe had long learnt the lessons from the genocide and massacres of our past, events at Srebrenica confronted us with our deep human failure to respect and protect the sanctity of life of those who are different from us.

The killing of 8,000 people and the failure of the international community to intervene remains a shameful tragedy. That it was committed on the basis of ethnic and religious identity requires us all, especially religious leaders, to be vigilant in the language we use and confront the discrimination and hate promoted in the name of religion.

As we remember on this, the anniversary of the genocide, our thoughts are with the many women who continue to carry the wounds

of their loss, mothers and wives, sisters and daughters.

We honour their pain not only by ensuring those who afflict such atrocities will face justice, but by giving hope

of a better future. A future based not simply on tolerance and respect, but a genuine desire to live with our deepest differences of faith in a spirit of reconciliation.

and of our responsibility to protect those in danger of genocide. The world

failed then, and—sadly— the world has failed since.

Srebrenica Memorial Day is an opportunity to salute the work of all those who have worked to shine a light on all that happened in the dark days of 1995 and to pledge to do all we can as religious or political leaders, or simply as citizens of the world, to reach out across the barriers between us and to work for justice and reconciliation.

The Most Rev Vincent Nichols Archbishop of Westminster

The Srebrenica genocide stands as a defining symbol of the Balkans conflict which put Europe—and indeed the international community—to shame in the last decade of the 20th century. It was a brutal reminder of the power of how conflicting identities, hatred and fears can blind us to our common humanity,

Remembering Srebrenica 19

Photo credit: James Gifford-Mead / Wikimedia Commons

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Rt Hon The Lord Ashdown Former Leader of the Liberal Democrats

Twenty-three years ago, the systematic murder of more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys tore the heart out of thousands of families.

Fathers, sons, husbands and brothers were wrenched from their loved ones.

With the clear sight of history we can see that the international community failed in preventing the genocide that unfolded.

Through error, misjudgement and inability to comprehend 20 Remembering Srebrenica

the true scope of the evil confronting us, the world did too little to save the people of Srebrenica.

That over 8000 people were systematically and brutally murdered in the name of ethnic and religious identity requires us all to be vigilant in the language we use. It obliges each and every one of us to challenge hatred and intolerance wherever they occur.

We should take inspiration from the courage of survivors of genocide who bravely share their testimony and those who, in the darkest of times, refused

to succumb to an ideology of hatred and division.

Keeping alive the memory of those atrocities committed 23 years ago is just part of what we owe the victims and communities that mourn them. Remembering painful truths about the past is the key to our shared quest for a better and more tolerant world.

The name “Srebrenica� should remind every one of us that pride in our own religious and ethnic heritage does not require or permit us to dehumanize or kill those who are different.

VOICES OF SUPPORT

Adama Dieng UN Secretary-General's Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide

I visited Srebrenica to pay tribute to the many people who lost their lives when the most terrible of crimes was committed there, the crime of genocide.

Remembering what happened in Srebrenica is not only about revisiting the events of the past. It is also about providing institutional support to the survivors and to those who mourn the lives that were lost.

The lessons of Srebrenica are many. In Srebrenica, we learn that the survivors and witnesses are true heroes.

They displayed immense courage by going to the courts to testify against

those who harmed them.

Their perseverance makes humanity proud. We also learn that genocide is part of a process and that it can be prevented. This is the most important lesson of all, because it can lead to

actionable change. I strongly believe that a meaningful commitment to remember requires an equally robust commitment to prevent.

My message to political and civic leaders all over the world is that no society is immune and we need to build all possible barriers against risk factors that lead to genocide. I am increasingly concerned at the instances of incitement to hatred, hate crimes and xenophobia that are present today in many corners of Western Europe. By explaining what happened in Srebrenica and by mobilising entire communities, Remembering Srebrenica is directly contributing to increasing resilience against atrocity crimes in the United Kingdom.

But in powerful contrast to that evil, I encountered such deep goodness in the Mothers of Srebrenica, and in the dignity and poise with which they live their

lives and hold onto the memories of their children.

Their decision to reject vengeance and hatred is a level of strength that left me speechless.

The pain of the survivors of Bosnia’s war will never go away. It is magnified by those who still callously deny history. It is therefore all the more important that all of us, as friends of the Bosnian people, help ensure the memory of Srebrenica can never fade. We must stand by Bosnia today and long into the future—in honour of all those who died, and in solidarity with those who mourn them still.

I will never forget walking around the factory site at PotoÄ?ari, where thousands of Bosnian men and boys were deliberately slaughtered in a brutal act of genocide.

The cold, empty and vacant space, and the walls lined with individual stories and mementoes, leave an indelible impression of horror that sinks deep into your bones.

It makes the beholder question humanity, and ask how anyone could possibly survive losing their family in such evil circumstances.

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore

Angelina Jolie Special Envoy for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

Remembering Srebrenica 21

The

Resister Genocide doesn’t happen overnight. Here we explore the road to genocide in Srebrenica through the eyes of survivors, and pay tribute to those who have the courage to resist hatred and division.

ers Standing together: School pupils in Jajce holding Croatian, Serbian and Bosnian flags in a show of solidarity to protest against segregation in their school.

Photo credit: Nickolas Rimać.

The Rise of Nationalism Austria Italy

Hungary

Slovenia

Romania

Croatia

Serbian Krajina Yugoslavia

25 JUNE

1991

Bulgaria Adriatic Sea Albania

Austria Italy

Greece

Hungary

Slovenia

Romania

Croatia

Serbian Krajina Yugoslavia

25 SEPTEMBER

1991

Bulgaria Adriatic Sea

Austria Italy

Greece

Hungary

Slovenia

Romania

Croatia

Serbian Krajina

3 MARCH

Macedonia Albania

1992

BosniaHerzegovina

Yugoslavia

Bulgaria Adriatic Sea

24 Remembering Srebrenica

Macedonia Albania

Greece

First declarations of independence After attempts to negotiate a peaceful transformation of Yugoslavia into a confederal state, with the individual republics holding primary authority, Croatia and Slovenia declare independence on the same day. Serbs respond by declaring the ‘Republic of Serbian Krajina’. Croats are driven out by force, until a ceasefire in January 1992, in which UNPROFOR is deployed to police this area.

Macedonia declares independence Unrest builds between those in favour of a multi-ethnic independent BosniaHerzegovina and nationalist minorities.

Radovan Karadžić warns the Bosnian parliament in October 1991: “Don’t think that you won’t take Bosnia-Herzegovina into hell, and the Muslim people maybe into extinction. Because the Muslim people cannot defend themselves if there is war here.”

Bosnia holds referendum on independence The SDS party forbids Serbs to vote, erecting road-blocks to prevent ballot-boxes entering the areas it controls and federal army planes drop leaflets supporting the boycott. Of the 64% who vote (including thousands of Serbs), 99.7% vote yes to ‘a sovereign and independent Bosnia-Herzegovina, a state of equal citizens and nations of Muslims, Serbs, Croats and others who live in it’.

THE RESISTERS

After World War II, Josip Broz Tito united a divided Yugoslavia under the motto “Brotherhood and Unity”. Following his death in 1980, nationalism rose under Milošević and the Socialist Democratic Federal Yugoslavia began to break down.

Austria Italy

Slovenia

Siege of Sarajevo begins

Hungary Romania

Croatia Republika Srpska

Serbian Krajina

HerzegBosnia

7 APRIL

1992 Slovenia

BosniaHerzegovina

Adriatic Sea

Macedonia Greece

Hungary Romania

Croatia Republika Srpska

Serbian Krajina

HerzegBosnia

27 APRIL

1992

Serbia and Montenegro BosniaHerzegovina

Adriatic Sea

Macedonia Greece

Croatia Republika Srpska

1995

Milošević declares new Federal State of Yugoslavia The state comprises Serbia and Montenegro alone, meaning that the Serb dominated Yugoslav army needs to at least appear to withdraw from Bosnian soil. Bosnian Serbs are transferred to the army of the “Serb Republic” under the command of General Ratko Mladić. This has the desired effect of causing Western politicians to miscategorise the conflict as a ‘civil war’.

Dayton Agreement reached

Hungary

Slovenia

NOVEMBER

Bulgaria

Albania

Austria Italy

Bulgaria

Albania

Austria Italy

Yugoslavia

Yugoslav Army forces, directed from Belgrade, and local Serb forces combine and lay siege on 5 April 1992, one day before Bosnia-Herzegovina is recognised by the EC as an independent nation. The siege will be the longest in modern military history.

Bosnian Serbs declare an independent Republika Srpska, unleashing a campaign of “ethnic cleansing” and violence across the north west and east of the country.

Romania Brčko District Serbia and Montenegro Federation of BosniaHerzegovina

Adriatic Sea

Bulgaria

Macedonia Albania

Image credit: Hoshie/Direktor/Wikimedia Commons

Greece

This divides Bosnia-Herzegovina into two republics, the Federation of BosniaHerzegovina and the Republika Srpska.

Under the Dayton Agreement, 49% of Bosnia-Herzegovina is controlled

by Republika Srpska, and 51% by the Federation. The two republics are highly decentralised, although it retains a central government with a rotating State Presidency.

Remembering Srebrenica 25

The Bosnian

Krajina The Bosnian Krajina region, in the northwest of the country and bordering Croatia, was hit by the bloody wave of so-called “ethnic cleansing” unleashed by the Bosnian Serb forces in the Prijedor region in May 1992.

3172

Bihać

Croatia

The Bosnian Krajina

BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

KILLED IN PRIJEDOR

30 April 1992

Serb shadow government assumes control of the region. Identification papers are required from everyone.

Massive discrimination against non-Serbs begins. Non-Serbs forced to surrender weapons.

26 Remembering Srebrenica

24 May 1992

Kozarac area shelled and stormed. Thousands of non-Serb civilians are murdered over the days that follow. Concentration camps at Omarksa, Trnopolje and Keraterm opened.

30–31 May 1992

Serb forces move through Prijedor region. Men are taken to Omarska and Keraterm; women and children to Trnopolje.

Community leaders are executed or imprisoned, women and men are sexually abused.

Croatia

In May 2012, Emir Hodžić, expelled from Prijedor at the age of just 14, returned to his hometown for the first time. Wearing a white armband, he tried to visit Omarska to pay his respects to those who had been killed, but was denied entry. Angered by this and by the local government’s blocking of a planned memorial, Emir stood by himself in the town square wearing a white armband. This sparked a viral photograph and the birth of White Armband Day.

Keraterm Kozarac Prijedor

Trnopolje

Omarska Banja Luka

Sanski Most

Manjača

STANDING UP— WHITE ARMBANDS

Republika Srpska

THE COURAGE TO RETURN

Most of the pre-war Muslim population from the region chose not to return, as it is now within the Republika Srpska.

Some brave souls chose to return and rebuild. Zumra Kararić reclaimed her home, despite its notoriously violent occupant, who continued to live there and threaten her for 5 years.

Baljvine

BALJVINE: THE VILLAGE THAT CHOSE PEACE

Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Town

June 1992

Concentration Camp

All non-Serbs required to wear white armbands and hang white sheets out of their houses. Mass killings continue—70,000 of the war’s 100,000 victims have been killed by the end of 1992.

Illustration: Jannah Haque

In WWII, the Muslim villagers of Baljvine protected their Serb neighbours from the fascist Ustaša. In the conflict of the 1990s, it was the Bosnian Serbs’ turn to protect their Muslim neighbours from Bosnian Serb forces. The mosque in Baljvine is the only mosque in what is now Republika Srpska that wasn’t destroyed, saved by Bosnian Serb villager Jovo Tesanović.

5 August 1992

Ed Vulliamy and Penny Marshall visit Omarska and Trnopolje at Karadžić’s invitation. Following the revelation of torture in the camps, Omarska and Keraterm closed at end of August.

1993–1995

Random killings continue in the region from 1993–1995.

At the end of the war, a second wave of “ethnic cleansing” is conducted by the Serbs before ceasefire on 12 October 1995.

Remembering Srebrenica 27

THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

The Opening Act of Genocide:

“Ethnic Cleansing”

Men being held in squalid conditions at Manjača Concentration Camp.

As war engulfed the former Yugoslavia, the Bosnian Krajina (“frontier”) region, historically famed for its natural beauty, became infamous for the inhumanity of concentration camps of Omarska, Trnopolje, Keraterm, and Manjača.

When Croatia declared independence in 1991, Serbs in the country, unnerved by increasing Croatian nationalism and radicalised by propaganda, wanted to be part of a “Greater Serbia” rather than an independent Croatia. The Bosnian Krajina region was key to the goal of “Greater Serbia”, as it would connect Serb-held territory in Croatia to Serbia in the east.

By the time Bosnia declared independence in March 1992, preparations were well underway for a Serb takeover of the region. A local shadow government had already been set up, and on the night of 29 April 1992, Bosnian Serb forces, aided by local police, took hold of Prijedor “without a single bullet fired”. Those bullets would come later, at those infamous camps and 28 Remembering Srebrenica

through the systematic displacement, torture, rape and murder that Karadžić euphemistically dubbed “ethnic cleansing”.

The initial wave of violence was unleashed around 24 May 1992, driving non-Serbs— mostly Bosnian Muslims—out of their towns and villages. Radio announcements from 31 May 1992 obliged non-Serbs to identify themselves by wearing white armbands, and by hanging white bedsheets from their windows.

“Radio announcements from 31 May 1992 obliged non-Serbs to identify themselves by wearing white armbands, and by hanging white bedsheets from their windows.”

THE RESISTERS—THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

The attacks followed a pattern of chaos and brutality. Families were forced out of their houses, men and women separated. Many men and boys were murdered on the spot. Women and girls were raped. Houses were burned.

Those that survived were separated and taken to different concentration camps—women, children and the elderly to Trnopolje, and men to the Omarska, Keraterm and Manjača camps. Omarska was the most notorious site of systematic torture, killing and sexual violence against its mostly male population. However acts of unspeakable violence occurred in all camps throughout the bloody summer of 1992.

It was the courage of two camp prisoners that would show the world the true horror of the camps. Dr Idriz Merdžanić was imprisoned in Trnopolje where, with vet Azra Blažević, he treated the victims of barbarity. Secretly, they photographed the injured prisoners. When journalists Ed Vulliamy and Penny Marshall came to Trnopolje in August 1992, Idriz and Azra smuggled the undeveloped film to them and showed the world what was really happening. Images of emaciated prisoners haunted our screens, painfully echoing atrocities that we believed were in the past.

Those headlines remind of us of a shocking reality: that the international community was aware of the inhuman realities of the camps as early as summer of 1992. Yet it would not be until the systematic murder of over 8,000 Bosniak men and boys in Srebrenica that so-called “ethnic cleansing” would be recognised as genocide.

Although many perpetrators have been convicted of war crimes by the international courts, the ethnic makeup of the region today tells its own story. Located within the Republika Srpska, the region is now majority Serb, a far cry from its multicultural past. “In a sense, ethnic cleansing was successful,” says Safet Vukalić, a survivor from Prijedor who now lives in the UK. “Most of us driven out by this so-called “ethnic cleansing”—which was actually genocide—have not gone back. The Serbs got what they wanted.”

Top and Bottom: Emaciated male prisoners at Trnopolje Concentration Camp. At concentration camps beatings, rape and murder took place on an industrial scale.

Photos above and opposite courtesy of Ron Haviv/VII/Blood and Honey.

Remembering Srebrenica 29

THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

The Courage to Testify

Nusreta Sivac

Nusreta Sivac was a judge in Prijedor when so called “ethnic cleansing” started.

One of 37 women taken to the infamous Omarska camp, and subjected to unimaginable sexual violence, Nusreta has bravely spoken out about her experience and encouraged others to do the same.

Before the war, I had a rather good life. I was 40 years old, working in Prijedor Municipal Court as a judge. My career was rising; I had everything to hope for. My parents had passed away, but I had my family. I had a normal, happy life. Unfortunately, most of us

Nusreta holding an award she received from HAWAR.Help in recognition of her activism and championing of human rights.

are unaware of our blessings while we have them. It took war and all those terrible things that happened for me to realise how great a life I had before the war.

When the local government in Prijedor was overthrown by the Serbian Democratic Party “SDS”, I lost my job. I went in to work and Bosnian Serb soldiers were waiting for me holding a list of names. They told me that I was no longer employed at the court.

I thought that this was the worst thing that could ever happen to me. Later, I realised that was only an introduction to the worst thing that could happen to a human being.

Several weeks later, on 9 June 1992, I was told to come to the police station for questioning.

Instead I was taken by Serb Nusreta and her family during their childhood in the former Yugoslavia.

30 Remembering Srebrenica

THE RESISTERS—THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

forces to Omarska concentration camp.

The camp was almost all male, but there were 37 women. We were kept in the interrogation rooms. During the day the guards would use the rooms to beat and torture prisoners, so we would have to wash blood and hair from everywhere—walls, furniture, floor—before we could sleep.

In Omarska I saw and experienced horrific things: tortures, murders, rapes. Things that one cannot even imagine human beings are capable of doing. Night times were the worst, because that is when the guards would come

“Night times were the worst, because that is when the guards would come to our rooms and take us away to rape us.”

to our rooms and take us away to rape us.

That happened on a regular basis. We were not allowed to say anything to anybody. I was regularly raped and beaten. I was the only remaining judge, all the other male Muslim and Croat judges had been killed.

Every day my day would start by counting the dead, who would be on the grass outside

Nusreta with Satko Mujagić a fellow Omarska Camp survivor turned activist.

Nusreta with Subdin Musić, a fellow Bosniak survivor of Trnopolje Concentration Camp. Both are paying their respects at the temporary memorial display for 102 children From Prijedor who lost their lives in the ethnic cleansing.

Remembering Srebrenica 31

THE RESISTERS—THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

the “white house”, where the worst torture was committed.

The detainees were forced to sing Serb nationalistic songs and make the Serb threefingered salute while their friends and neighbours were tortured and screamed for help. The worst feeling was that I could not do anything.

I felt helpless. I could not help all those who were suffering so much.

When the Red Cross and ITN visited Omarska on 5 August 1992, the Serbs Above: Nusreta with the former mayor of Srebrenica Ćamil Duraković (left) told them that there were no and Sudbin Musić. Below: Nusreta meeting with Angela Merkel, the women there. When the visit Chancellor of Germany. was announced, the women were moved to Trnopolje camp. Five of the women didn’t survive Omarska: four were buried in a mass grave, and one has still not been found.

While all this was happening to us, people remained silent, which was disappointing.

Their silence was an act in itself. Maybe Serbs were in fear for their own lives, afraid that they might end up in the concentration camps as well, I don’t know. But there was the only option I had at that time. So I were many, and they were in majority, that was fantasizing, that if I survive the camp, supported the crimes, loud and clear. which was at that time an unrealistic scenario, I gave myself a task, during the time I that I would be talking about all that has spent in the camp. That whole time I was happened in that camp for as long as I live. daydreaming, fantasizing because fantasizing And, thank God, that is what I have been doing for over 25 years.

The moment I arrived in free territory in Zagreb, Croatia, at the end of 1992 and was able to speak, I started immediately to talk about the horrific crimes that happened in my city. My focus was especially on Omarska, where I saw with my own eyes, and personally experienced, the most brutal crimes. At that time there was no official mechanism in place that would record all of these crimes, but I kept talking about what happened and what I had witnessed. It was there that I first made contact with the Hague Tribunal investigators.

I was working with Jadranka Cigelj, another female survivor of Omarska, to collect as

“The worst feeling was that I could not do anything.

I felt helpless.

I could not help all those who were suffering so much.”

32 Remembering Srebrenica

THE RESISTERS—THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

many testimonies as we could, and in 1995 we were invited to the Hague to help prepare the first indictments for the ICTY. I have testified many times against the perpetrators and architects of these crimes. I am happy that our experiences were recognised, that the court accepted rape as a war crime, and that the Tribunal prosecuted some of those who were responsible for these crimes.

My great satisfaction was the impact I had on other women—also war rape victims—

who heard my story and decided to tell their stories as well, even if they were reluctant or ashamed to talk initially. I know that many women did not speak about their experiences because it is extremely difficult to think and talk about it, even for me today, but I have to be strong and let my voice be heard.

I speak on behalf of those who were killed, those who didn’t make it, those who are unable to speak. I see that not as courage, but rather my obligation. And I am not afraid of talking about it. I am talking about it even here, in the same community in which I experienced all these terrible things. I returned to Prijedor some 15 years ago. It is difficult to come back.

There is discrimination against returnees— I wasn’t able to get my old job back. A former co-worker had taken my apartment so I had to fight to get him out. When people realised I was back to stay, I came home one night to find “Omarksa” spray painted on my door. One day, I was walking down the street in Prijedor, and saw one of the guards that I testified against.

He had been released, having served twothirds of his sentence. We stared at each other. He was the first one to lower his head.

There is silence here about what happened, from the media, the authorities, from everywhere. My motivation to speak up is all those who are no longer alive. All my family members, my friends, those that were killed only because their identity did not fit the ideology of the Bosnian Serb authorities at that time. There are many brave people who are trying to speak out that are not getting the spotlight.

Some are trying to silence them, others to manipulate their suffering for political ends. Those that have the courage to speak out need to be supported and given space Nusreta with awarding-winning British journalist and author Ed Vulliamy. to talk. Only then can we Vulliamy reported on the Bosnian war for the UK press and helped expose build a better future. the human rights abuses and ethnic cleansing in Omarska Camp.

“I speak on behalf of those who were killed, those who didn’t make it, those who are unable to speak.”

Remembering Srebrenica 33

THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

The Courage to Return

Sudbin Musić

Sudbin was only 18 years old when Bosnian Serb forces murdered his father and sent him to Trnopolje Concentration Camp.

Having survived the socalled “ethnic cleansing”, he returned home to rebuild his community.

I was only 18 when the Serb military arrived in my village. I remember at that time MTV had just started broadcasting on our TVs, and like teenagers all over the world, I was obsessed with music! I had no idea that within a matter of months, my life would be turned upside down. Čarakovo is a small village in Prijedor, the majority of the residents were Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims). Like many other towns and villages, since May 1992, our energy supplies had been cut off. We had no electricity, no water, and no contact with the outside world.

On 20th July 1992, young survivors from other villages came to our town. They told us they had seen rivers of blood, and piles of human bodies. We did not want to believe them. Two days later, on 23rd July, the Bosnian Serb army came to our village.

In the first hour, they massacred 214 people.

Then they arrived at my house.

34 Remembering Srebrenica

It all happened so quickly—one minute we were sitting peacefully at home, and the next our village was being destroyed. After that, they arrested my brother and me. Then they threw my mother and two sisters out of the house and set the house alight.

Unbeknown to me, my father and his friends had rushed home thinking we were still inside.

Just as they arrived, the soldiers shot them dead on the spot and threw their bodies in the reservoir outside our house.

Over the next five days, the Serbs went from village to village, exterminating every

“They told us they had seen rivers of blood and piles of human bodies.”

Photo credit (above): Irfan Redzovic

THE RESISTERS—THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

Sudbin Musić at a International Commission for Missing Persons (ICMP) facility. ICMP are still identifying the remains of those killed during the genocide and ethnic cleansing in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

single person they found. They massacred six Muslim and one Catholic village, killing more than 1,500 people. Meanwhile, my brother and I were to learn our fate. There were buses and trucks present to transport prisoners, an ambulance, and even a refrigerated van to take bodies away. It was a well-planned, systematic killing spree.

My brother and I were put on a bus. By chance, the driver was a good friend of my father. He was Serbian, but he was a good man, and he saved our lives. We were supposed to board the next bus, which was

heading to Keraterm. But he insisted that we be allowed to board his bus. Somehow, we were granted permission. Every man and boy on the other bus was killed that day.

Sometime later, we arrived at Trnopolje Camp.

Trnopolje Camp held people for deportation. It was filled mainly with women and children. The few men that were imprisoned in the camp lived in constant fear that they would be killed. We all roamed the grounds, waiting anxiously for death to come.

After a while, you lose the concept of time altogether. It felt like we had been trapped there for years. The conditions were horrific. The women were systematically raped at Trnopolje. They were kept in a separate building to the men, but we could hear them suffer.

My brother and I attempted to board one of the trucks headed for the free territory one day. The truck was packed with women and children.

People pushed and shoved in Members of Sudbin’s family who were killed in the ethnic cleansing of the a desperate attempt to board.

Bosnian Krajina, (Bottom Middle) is Sudbin’s father, (Top left- Middle) Three I managed to climb onto the of the youngest victims of identity-based violence in Prijedor.

Remembering Srebrenica 35

THE RESISTERS—THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

truck, but when I looked back for my brother, I realised he had been pulled away by a soldier.

I sat motionless on the truck. I could not believe we were being separated. He was only a boy. I couldn’t just leave him. In the anguish of that moment, coupled with the heat and exhaustion, I fainted. When I came to, I was back in the camp. It was a bittersweet moment: I was reunited with my brother, but I was back in the concentration camp.

Sometime later, my mother and my two sisters arrived at Trnopolje. It was a miracle, for I was certain they had been killed. My mother had seen my school friend and asked about me. My friend had then introduced her to the bus driver who had helped my brother and me. Soon after, a Serbian officer visited the camp. He saw how poor the conditions were, with the overcrowding and lack of sanitation. He quickly organised an extra bus for the women who refused to leave the camp without their sons. He was an angel. I still cannot believe he did that for us.

Early in the morning, we set off as a single convoy. The journey was incredibly excruciating, as we travelled 200km in

crammed buses. Despite knowing the Serb officer had done us a kindness, I still questioned whether the convoy was really headed to the free territory. It was always at the back of my mind that we would all be killed as soon as the convoy stopped.

After what felt like days of travel, we finally arrived in central Bosnia. We were told to leave the bus, and start walking. After a 40km march, we arrived at the town of Travnik, which was swarming with refugees. Travnik is a very small town. Before the war, its original population was 40,000. And now, there were 120,000 of us, crammed into every possible building in sight.

It was unimaginable. We stayed here for 75 days.

“The town was completely untouched, it was as if time had stood still.”

Subdin Musić looking out over Prijedor and the surrounding area which is still underpopulated twenty-three years after the ethnic cleansing.

36 Remembering Srebrenica

THE RESISTERS—THE BOSNIAN KRAJINA

“Rebuilt places without people are no different to an area that has been ethnically cleansed.”

Sudbin Musić pictured in Trnopolje Concentration Camp with fellow detainees.

There was no food, and hardly any supplies to tend to those injured or ill. When the Red Cross finally arrived, I was a mere 46kilos in weight—mostly skin and bones.

The Red Cross sent us to Slovakia, where we stayed for two years. Then we moved to Germany for five years. From there, my brother went to Holland and then to the USA. He is now settled in Chicago. Alongside us, a staggering 2 million Bosnians were displaced because of the war. For my brother, the experience was too horrific, he didn’t want to return because the trauma he had

endured. I didn’t want to go home either.

I don’t want to pretend to be hero, but in 2000 I returned home.

I found the remains of my father and his friends still where they had been dumped five years previously. The town was completely untouched. It was as if time had stood still.

Gradually, more people who had managed to survive began to return. We started to reconstruct houses, with ours being the first to be rebuilt. I will never forget the first night we spent in that house, we all cried for a long time.

Now, we are as beautiful a town as we were back then, if not more. There are less than 500 of us, but it is home. I hope our people will realise that they have to return, that rebuilt places without people are no different to an area that has been ethnically cleansed. We gave our all, every last bit of strength we had to return to create a place we could return to. I live on my own in my house, but I am content. This is my country, my house, my rose bush, and my dog.

It is astounding to me that a mere 20km from me lies a border to a European Union country. And yet, we were subjected to the most brutal kind of torture under the watchful gaze of Europe Sudbin returned home in the year 2000 and slowly rebuilt his life in home village Čarakovo (left) Sudbin’s dog named Lucky. and the world.

Remembering Srebrenica 37

THE SARAJEVO HAGGADAH

The Sarajevo Haggadah, one of the oldest Sephardic Haggadahs in the world, is an important symbol of Bosnia’s long history of multiculturalism. It is also a symbol of survival. In World War II, Islamic scholar Dervis Korcut risked his life to save the Haggadah from the Nazis, smuggling it out of the National Library. During the siege of Sarajevo, the Haggadah was also rescued and stashed in a bank vault.

BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

Sarajevo

Vogošća

Reljevo

The only route in and out of Sarajevo was over the runway at the UN controlled airport, which was vulnerable to Bosnian Serb snipers. In March 1993, the Bosnian Army started building a tunnel to connect Sarajevo to the Free Territory. A symbol of hope for struggling Sarajevans, bringing supplies into the city and the possibility of escape for those trapped within.

Bosna R ive r

Bojnik

TUNNEL OF HOPE

Area under siege Osjek

TUNNEL

Blažuj

Ilidža

UN Dobrinja Butmir

SARAJEVO’S ROMEO AND JULIET

On 19 May 1993, Admira Ismić, a Bosnian Muslim, and Boško Brkić, a Bosnian Serb, approached the Vrbanja bridge in Sarajevo.

As the couple approached the bridge, shots were fired, killing Boško instantly.

Admira, who had also been shot, crawled over to him, hugged him, and died a few minutes later. It was seven days before their bodies could be recovered from the infamous Sniper’s Alley.

1 March 1992

Bosnia holds referendum for independence. Bosnian Serb leadership calls for a boycott, but of the 64% who vote, including thousands of Serbs, 99.7% vote for a multi-faith, multi-ethnic independent Bosnia.

38 Remembering RememberingSrebrenica Srebrenica

Sokolović Kolonija

Free Bosnian Territory

Hrasnica

Kotorac

Vojkovići

Igman

6 April 1992

The EU recognises Bosnia’s independence. Over 100,000 people demonstrate for peace. Serb snipers fire on the crowd, killing Suada Dilberović and Olga Sučić, the first victims of the war.

22 July 1993

3,777 shells fall on Sarajevo in a single day, the heaviest throughout the siege. By September 1993, urbicide is nearly complete—almost every building in the city is damaged, and 35,000 completely destroyed.

Special thanks to Sarajevo Tunnel Museum for map information.

Sarajevo

Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina Poljine

City Under Siege

Mrkovići Barice

Kobilja Glava

ljacka Rive Mi

The siege of Sarajevo was the longest siege in modern history.

Bosnian Serb forces surrounded the city for almost 4 years, shelling civilians daily.

r

Vraca

Lukavica Trebević

Republika Srpska

Serb Military Positions Front line

11,541 KILLED DURING THE SIEGE

643 CHILDREN KILLED DURING THE SIEGE

River

5 February 1994

The first Markale marketplace massacre causes the single biggest lost of life with 68 civilians killed and 200 wounded. This marks the beginning of the longest ceasefire during the siege.

Illustration: Jannah Haque

28 August 1995

The second Markale marketplace massacre kills 37 people and wounds a further 90, prompting NATO airstrikes on Bosnian Serb positions. The tide of the war starts to turn.

29 February 1996 After the signing of the Dayton Peace Agreement on 14 December 1995, the siege is officially declared to be over. It has lasted 47 months—the longest siege in modern history.

Remembering Srebrenica 39

SARAJEVO

City of Courage The name Sarajevo conjures up many images.

A city where you can find a mosque, a synagogue, an Orthodox church and a Catholic cathedral within 500 metres of each other, Sarajevo Tunnel of Hope. This 800 metre tunnel was used to symbolises the spirit of Bosnia-Herzegovina— bring supplies into Sarajevo during the siege. a multi-faith, multi-ethnic melting pot. Host to Photo credit: Athena Lao/Wikimedia Commons. the Winter Olympics in 1984, it was everything an Olympic city was meant to be—steeped in to the streets, calling for peace. Unknown to history, yet thoroughly modern. them, the Yugoslav National Army (now the de All this would change overnight on 6 April facto Serbian army) had already surrounded 1992, the day that Bosnia was recognised Sarajevo, positioned in those same mountains as an independent country by the European that had housed Olympic ski slopes less than a Community. “We went back 200 years decade before. The next day, Serb snipers opened overnight”, says Rešad Trbonja, survivor of fire from the roof of the Holiday Inn, killing two the siege. “When you were getting your first young women on the Vrbanja bridge. The siege of computers, we were learning how to build fires.”

Sarajevo had begun.

A month beforehand, a referendum on Overnight everything changed. Electricity independence had politically divided Bosniaand water were cut off. Food reserves soon Herzegovina. The majority of Bosnians ran out as Serb forces controlled all routes in wanted to be a part of an independent, and out of the city, and people were forced multi-ethnic state, but some Serbs, influenced by propaganda, wanted to be part of a Serb nation, a “Greater Serbia”. 64% of the population, including thousands of Serbs, turned up to vote. 99.7% voted in favour of “a sovereign and independent BosniaHerzegovina, a state of equal citizens and nations of Muslims, Serbs, Croats and others who live in it.”

On 4 April 1992, a handful students started a small peace rally. By 5 April, thanks to A United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) armoured personnel live coverage by Sarajevo TV, carrier passes the Presidency building in Sarajevo. Photo credit: Christian 100,000 Sarajevans had taken Marechal/Wikimedia Commons.

40 Remembering Srebrenica

THE RESISTERS—SARAJEVO

The Cellist of Sarajevo: A cello player in the partially destroyed City Hall, Sarajevo, during the siege of the city in 1992.

Photo credit: Mikhail Evstafiev/Wikimedia Commons.

to rely on humanitarian aid. Every day, hundreds of shells rained down on Sarajevo, and snipers in the mountains took aim at civilians. “One thing was certain in Sarajevo every morning”, said Trbonja. “That day could be the day you die.” The siege would claim over 11,000 lives in 44 months.

Every day, Sarajevans would face a terrible choice—to get food or water and risk being hit by a sniper or shell, or go without. In May 1992,

A city under siege: A government building in the centre of Sarajevo burns after being hit by tank fire during the siege in 1992. Photo credit: Mikhail Evstafiev/Wikimedia Commons.

“One thing was certain in Sarajevo every morning, that day could be the day you die.” a shell hit a queue of people waiting for bread in downtown Sarajevo, killing 22 people.

This senseless act of violence prompted cellist Vedran Smailović to play his cello at the spot where the shell hit. This protest became emblematic of the courage and spirit of the people of Sarajevo.

Artists were important agents of resistance throughout the siege, but Sarajevans of all backgrounds and ages found ingenious ways to stand up to “the barbarians in the mountains”—with their dignity, with their humour and above all with their courage.

After more than three years of constant bombardment, it was another massacre in the Markale marketplace—6 weeks after the Srebrenica genocide—that finally prompted NATO strikes against Serb forces. The Dayton Peace Agreement was signed on 14 December 1995, bringing the longest siege in modern history to an end.

Remembering Srebrenica 41

SARAJEVO

The Courage to Dream

Predrag Pašić

In a sense, my life started with football.

I was born in the maternity hospital next to the Kosovo stadium and my parents also had an apartment next to the stadium.

I started playing football as a child, and it eventually became my professional life.

I have spent over 40 years in football.

I have had beautiful moments and I am happy that I was raised through sport.

I was playing for F.K. Sarajevo when Radovan Karadžić was appointed as our sports psychologist. At the time, ideas about psychological training were only just emerging, but all the clubs had psychologists. To us young 20 year old guys, the whole thing seemed rather funny.

At that time Karadžić was the Head of the Neuropsychiatric clinic in Kosovo, and he also wrote children’s books. The Karadžić that we knew seemed completely harmless—we were always making fun of him and joking with him. But when 42 Remembering Srebrenica

Photo credit: Alchetron/Tripti Joshi

Predrag Pašić was an international footballer before the war. When Bosnian Serb forces surrounded Sarajevo, he had the choice to leave the besieged city. Instead, he chose to stay and to set up a football school for children of all faiths and ethnicities.

the war started, he transformed into a completely different person. Our team had players from every region and religion, and Karadžić had taught us that we could only win together, playing as one team.

Then, when he entered politics, he talked only about one religion and one people.

For those of us who knew him before the war, this was difficult to understand.

Even today I cannot believe that these two personas were actually one person.

“Karadžić had taught us that we could only win together, playing as one team.”

THE RESISTERS—SARAJEVO

“The mission of sport is a human one—it does not know any borders.”

Before the war, after finishing my football career I was the owner of a gallery and I couldn’t have been happier. The war returned me back to football. As everybody knew me through football and my football role, I realised it was through football that I would be able to make any significant impact. The decision to open a football school came from the realisation that the children of Sarajevo When the war broke out in Bosnia, and were endangered the most by war. They had Sarajevo was surrounded, I was offered the no life, activities, playing time, fantasies, chance to leave with NATO forces. But I nothing. We all love football so much in couldn’t leave. Sarajevo is the city I was born this country, so football could provide an in. I was an idol to many generations while opportunity for children to gather and to playing for F.K. Sarajevo. start dreaming their own Therefore I considered it my dreams, even in war. duty to remain in the city that The school was multicreated me, shaped me both ethnic because that was as an idol and as a human the normal thing before being. I was proud of that city the war. We all grew up before the war, it was a city of together. We all had mixed rainbow colours, in which East marriages. I am Orthodox, and West were mixed, a city but married a Catholic. My of sounds from all over the daughter married a Muslim world. You could walk down and we have always been the street and see churches, happy about that. The synagogues, and mosques. friends that I was playing You could hear the sounds of football with were praying the bells and the muezzin. All in the mosque, and that was of us felt pride in it. not a problem of any kind to us. The mission of sport is a human one—it does not know any borders.

We made the announcement on the radio “Predrag Pašić opens an academy for future champions in Sarajevo”.

We expected six or seven kids as it was wartime, and the circumstances were unbearable, but at our first training session some 300 boys showed up. That left us speechless. Those children gave us the power to survive.

Top image: Predrag Pašić in 1982. Photo credit: Alchetron/Tripti Joshi.

The moment we saw those Bottom image: Bosnian youths playing football. Pašić continued to teach boys in training and saw young people to play football during the Siege of Sarajevo. Photo credit: them dreaming about having F. Pavkovic/Wikimedia Commons.

Remembering Srebrenica 43

THE RESISTERS—SARAJEVO

football careers in the future, we realised we were on the right path. Their dreams were so much stronger than the feelings of hate. Every day of the war, children came to train and they were happy to come. We could hear the sounds of the war outside, the shelling, the shots of the snipers. Some of the children’s parents were in opposing armies but because of the power of football, there was no tension on the pitch, everyone was playing together peacefully. The children simply did not understand hate. They saw that everyone was the same, and this idea was reinforced through the unifying power of sport. I have always believed in the philosophy of sport, those ideas around fair play and respecting your opponent. Our energy was coming from the children, from their desire to fight all that was happening around them.

Their desire to have a normal life, in spite of the war, was the same desire that we grownups had. This desire brought us together and gave us a tremendous strength to survive. For us in Sarajevo, courage manifested in the daily struggle to survive.

Every citizen of Sarajevo, in my opinion was a hero, every single day. Our acts of courage were the struggle for food, struggle for water, through the desires of those who organised cultural events in spite of the war.

Actually, through our determination to try 44 Remembering Srebrenica

Photo credit: Martin Belam/Wikimedia Commons

“Their dreams were so much stronger than the feelings of hate. Every day of the war, children came to train and they were happy to come.”

Pašić was playing professional football for F.K Sarajevo whilst Karadžić was also working at the club as a sports psychologist.

and live as normal a life as possible in spite of the evil that was happening all around us.

This work at the football school has been the highlight of my football career. Most people don’t even know about the work I do at the school—they know me mostly as a football star—but it has been the highlight of my entire life’s work. Now we

Predrag Pašić continues to be an advocate against hatred.

Photo credit: Alchetron/Tripti Joshi.

THE RESISTERS—SARAJEVO

have several schools across the country.

We have Bosniak, Serb and Croat kids— they get to know each other, learn to accept differences. They travel across majority lines within the country to tournaments and play together when we pick an international team. Kids that wouldn’t even get the chance

“For us in Sarajevo, courage manifested in the daily struggle to survive. Every citizen of Sarajevo, in my opinion was a hero, every single day.”

to meet are playing wearing the same shirt, on the same team.

I was approached a few years ago to take part in Football Rebels, a documentary series with Eric Cantona about footballers doing something positive for their own people. At first it was very difficult for me to tell my story, but then I saw this film in Paris about football players trying to do something great off the football pitch. That’s what inspired me to get involved with the Football Rebels series and speak out.

We do not see enough courage today in Bosnia. Unfortunately, the struggle we went through in the war has turned us into observers today: observers of human rights violations, of segregation, of pillage. We have developed this new custom from the war—to be satisfied as long as we have food and water. We don’t seem to have the motivation to be brave again. We owe it to the victims to have the courage to change the legacy of the war and Bosnia today.

Predrag Pašić says that his work at the Football School has been the highlight of his football career.

Remembering Srebrenica 45

SARAJEVO

The Courage to Defend

Jovan Divjak

Photo credit: Leontom16/Wikimedia Commons

Jovan Divjak was a Commander of the Territorial Defence in Sarajevo when the war in Bosnia began.

In April 1992, he stayed in Sarajevo to be part of the multi-ethnic ABiH, defending the city and its civilians.

I was born in Belgrade and moved to Bosnia with my family, where my younger sister was born. After secondary school, I went to the military academy because my mother could not afford to pay for my education—my parents were divorced by that time. I moved to Sarajevo in 1966, and for 18 years I was part of the military education system and just before the war, I was made Territorial Defence Commander of Sarajevo, holding the rank of General.

In 1991, I was prosecuted by the military attorney of the Yugoslav National Army (JNA), for allowing local police forces to take JNA weapons to protect their communities.

In April 1992, I received a phone call from General Siber, who was the Commanding 46 Remembering Srebrenica

General of the Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina (ABiH). He asked me to attend what would turn out to be a historic meeting—the establishment of an organised multinational army, to defend multi-ethnic Bosnia from any kind of attack and to protect its independence and sovereignty.

We were a multi-ethnic force—our Commander was Bosniak and our deputy commanders (of which I was one) were Croat

“It’s hard to start a war, but it’s even harder to finish it.”

THE RESISTERS—SARAJEVO

and Serb (although I identify as BosnianHerzegovinian). I felt it was my moral obligation to stand with those who were in danger, and to offer my professional, military knowledge to the soldiers to enable them to stand against any threat that might come.

At first, I did not believe there would be a war, what was happening in Croatia felt far removed from us. There was some talk about war on a very small scale, taking place elsewhere in Bosnia, but never war in Sarajevo due to its multi-ethnic, multireligious and multicultural foundations. We considered it impossible. So I was stunned when the attack on Sarajevo began.

In the beginning, I was telling my soldiers this won’t last longer than a month or two.

Later on, when I realised the military power we were facing, I told them the war will last three to three and a half years. Even now when they see me—they still ask how did I know it would last that long? And I tell them: it’s hard to start a war, but it’s even harder to finish it.

I never felt the need to leave Sarajevo, not even in 1993, when then US Ambassador Jakowitch told me that all I needed to do, is to say the word and he would arrange for me to get out. I considered it more important to stay here to make it easier for others to get through the war. Many Serbs stayed in the city during the war, around 30,000 of them. The ABiH was 12% Serb and there were Serbs in the police and civil defence, in media and hospitals, and two Serb members of the Bosnian Presidency. All those who decided to stay here and defend their homes and their families, they were also defending the multiCivilians helping the injured during the Siege of Sarajevo. Photo credit: Evstafiev/Wikimedia Commons. ethnic spirit of the city.

I had decided to stand on the side of Bosnian citizens and the citizens of Sarajevo.

I did not act from a political standpoint, but from the standpoint of my profession, which was to help Bosnian citizens to stand up and to resist the aggression.

I identify first as a Bosnian-Herzegovinian, because it’s pure egoism to belong to just one nation, one religion. One’s greatness is when one belongs to the world, to nature, and is not a slave A destroyed district of Sarajevo during the siege. Photo credit: Hedwig to a religion or a nation.

Klawuttke/Wikimedia Commons.

Remembering Srebrenica 47

THE RESISTERS—SARAJEVO

Residents of Sarajevo stand in line to get water in 1992. Photo credit: Mikhail Evstafiev/Wikimedia Commons.

I was a witness in one case before the Hague Tribunal, and when identifying myself, I stated: Earthling, from the planet Earth. I belong to this city. Going to theatres, attending funerals, weddings, birthdays… I lived the rhythm of this city. Citizens have accepted me as part of their families and when I visited my soldiers in different neighbourhoods, I was usually greeted with applause, which gave me a moral satisfaction—that I was in the right place, being of service to others.

In 1994, I set up the Foundation “Education Builds Bosnia-Herzegovina”. This benefits children and young victims of war, including disabled children and young people in social need from all ethnic groups. When I was young, we were taught that religion is the opium of the people. Today, I think that education in Bosnia is being used in a similar way. Children are not learning what really happened in Bosnia. Take Srebrenica.

Serb children today learn about the NATO bombardment of Serbia, but not about the genocide in Srebrenica. Milorad Dodik, President of Republika Srpska, has said numerous times that in their history books, 48 Remembering Srebrenica

“I felt it was my moral obligation to stand with those who were in danger.”

A city under siege: buildings in Sarajevo damaged by constant bullet and mortar fire. Photo credit: Michal Huniewicz/Wikimedia Commons.

THE RESISTERS—SARAJEVO

“In the world today, our obligation is to do everything we can to prevent war and confrontation.” there will never be a mention of a genocide or the siege of Sarajevo. Similarly, young people in the Federation do not learn that the ABiH also committed war crimes. History has long roots and the roots of this go back to the long history of Yugoslavia and Bosnia.

Genocide in Srebrenica did not only take place over a few days on 11 July. It started way back, with ethnic cleansing in the River Drina Valley at the end of 1991, and genocide in Prijedor with the mass graves at Tomašica, Ključ, Sanski Most, Zvornik, Višegrad. The story of Srebrenica has to be above all the story of human relationships, since there are numerous examples of people protecting one another.

Today, we have a real need for education on Srebrenica and Bosnia-Herzegovina and what happened here. We need history textbooks for Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia that can serve as a tool of justice. We need to spread as far as we can the Hague Tribunal verdicts against Mladić, Karadžić, Beara, Krstić and others.

We need to educate people not only about the genocide in Srebrenica, but the genocides in Rwanda and in Syria today. Only when you have that wider context can you understand Srebrenica. We need to learn from how other countries have dealt with genocide—Rwanda, as a state, dealt with the genocide through the judicial system and reconciliation, and showed how these things need to be done.

I decided to stay in Sarajevo and defend the city because that was my moral and professional obligation. In the world today, our obligation is to do everything we can to prevent war and confrontation. Every country has groups —civil organisations, NGOs—advocating peaceful resolution and non-confrontation and they should get all the support there is. That is how we prevent future conflict and build a better future for our young people.

Destroyed buildings in the Sarajevo skyline in 1996. Photo credit: Quasimodogeniti/Wikimedia Commons.

Remembering Srebrenica 49

BIJELJINA

48 1992

RESISTING HATE

Although many Serbs in Eastern Bosnia participated in the violence of “ethnic cleansing”, many also resisted.

In Bijeljina, Serb headmaster Lazar Manojlović refused to only enrol Serb pupils or to hand over lists of non-Serbs. On national TV, he said that he recognised only two ethnonationalities in his school—the nation of students and the nation of teachers.

Brčko District

GLOGOVA

64 1992

Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina

THE COURAGE TO TESTIFY

The world would not have known what happened to the men that went missing from Srebrenica without the eyewitness testimonies of the very few men that survived the mass executions, such as Dr Neždad Avdić. It is the testimony of these brave survivors that has made sure that Srebrenica has been recognised as genocide and brought the perpetrators to justice.

Serbia

VLASENICA

700 1992

SREBRENICA

62

CHILDREN

1993

HOPING FOR PEACE

The Srebrenica Youth Council was set up in hope—hope for a better future for the younger generation in Srebrenica who are growing up in the shadow of war. One sign that the younger generation is putting divisions of the past behind them is the love story of Radomirka and Hariz, the first mixed marriage in Srebrenica since the genocide.

1 April 1992

So-called “ethnic cleansing” in Eastern Bosnia begins in Bijeljina, killing at least 48 Muslims. The Yugoslav National Army and Serbian paramilitary force Arkan’s Tigers continue “ethnic cleansing” down through Eastern Bosnia.

50 Remembering RememberingSrebrenica Srebrenica

Republika Srpska

11 March 1993

Trapped in the town by the desperate women of Srebrenica, UN Commander in Bosnia General Philippe Morillon declares “I am now putting you under the protection of the United Nations.”

16 April 1993

UN Security Council Resolution 819 declares Srebrenica as a “safe area”.

Resolution 836 later extends this to five other enclaves: Sarajevo, Bihać, Goražde, Tuzla, and Žepa.

UN “Safe Areas”

ZVORNIK

2000 1992–1995

SREBRENICA

8372 1995

VIŠEGRAD

3000

Eastern Bosnia

Bordering Serbia along the River Drina, Bosnian Serb forces sought to annex Eastern Bosnia to create a “Greater Serbia”.

1992

BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

Eastern Bosnia

FOČA

2704 1992–1994

MAP KEY Towns

8 March 1995

Radovan Karadžić issues Directive 7, ordering the Bosnian Serb Forces to “create an unbearable situation of total insecurity, with no hope of further survival or life for the inhabitants of Srebrenica or Zepa.”

Illustration: Jannah Haque

4 June 1995

Col. Karremans, Dutchbat commander in Srebrenica, informs his superiors that Dutchbat is no longer able to fulfil their mission in Srebrenica as they are effectively “hostage” to the Bosnian Serbs.

11 July 1995

After five days of shelling, General Mladić and Bosnian Serb forces take the town of Srebrenica. In the days that follow, 8,372 Bosnian Muslim men and boys are murdered in an act of genocide.

Remembering Srebrenica 51

EASTERN BOSNIA

The Final Act of Genocide

The Fall of Srebrenica

Photojournalist Ron Haviv, invited by Arkan himself, witnessed this brutality. The photograph above, of a Serb Volunteer Guard kicking a dying woman, prompted Arkan to put a death warrant out on his life.

On 1 April 1992, before the first shots of the war had been fired in Sarajevo, the residents of Bijeljina were already coming to understand the real meaning of so-called “ethnic cleansing”. Serb controlled forces, working with Serbian paramilitary groups such as Arkan’s Tigers, seized the town. Houses were looted and set alight, mosques razed to the ground and civilians murdered in the first mass killing of the war.

This violent pattern of chaos and destruction was repeated up and down Eastern Bosnia throughout the spring of 1992. Foča. Vlasenica. Zvornik. Bratunac.

Višegrad. The goal? To incorporate Eastern Bosnia—separated from Serbia only by the River Drina—into a “Greater Serbia”.

52 Remembering Srebrenica

By the end of April 1992, 95% of Muslims in the region had been driven out of their homes. As those who had been “ethnically cleansed” sought safety, they were drawn towards three enclaves where the Bosnian Army had resisted Bosnian Serb forces— Srebrenica, Žepa and Goražde.

By early 1993, the population of the former spa town of Srebrenica had swollen from around 6,000 to over 40,000.

“Amidst hell, the courage and ingenuity of the women of Srebrenica kept their families alive.”

THE RESISTERS— EASTERN BOSNIA

Surrounded by hostile forces, life was unbearable in the enclave, with daily shelling, overcrowding and lack of food and medical assistance. Amidst hell, the courage and ingenuity of the women of Srebrenica kept their families alive.

These women would change the course of history on 11 March 1993. Barricading General Philippe Morillon of the UN into Srebrenica, demanding assistance, Morillon took the unprecedented step of declaring: “You are now under the protection of the United Nations… I will never abandon you.” The first ever UN “safe area” was born. On 16 April 1993 Security Council Resolution 819 was passed and the first UN peacekeepers arrived.

Despite the UN Peacekeepers and the ceasefire, the situation in Srebrenica continued to deteriorate over the next two years. By March 1995, the “safe areas” were all that stood between Karadžić and his goal of an Eastern Bosnia comprised solely of Bosnian Serbs. Karadžić responded with Directive 7, to “create an unbearable situation of total insecurity with no hope of further survival or life for the inhabitants of Srebrenica”.

On 6 July 1995, Bosnian Serb forces began shelling the enclave. The Dutch UN Peacekeepers, hopelessly outnumbered, requested NATO air strikes in vain. By the time air strikes had been approved, it was too late—Srebrenica had already fallen.

The terrified population had split itself in two, with the majority of the men and boys trying to escape to Bosnian free territory through the mountains. 25,000 women, children, and the elderly made for the UN base at Potočari, where they begged the UN forces to protect them from Mladić and his army.

Over the next days, the final act of genocide in Bosnia would unfold.

Thousands of men and boys in the escaping column would be captured and bused to holding areas. Men and boys would be taken away for “questioning” from the crowds at Potočari, amidst scenes from hell—rapes of girls as young as 9, murders of newborn babies, suicides. Over the space of a week, more than 8,000 men and boys would be taken to mass execution sites, shot point blank, and buried in mass graves. Only a handful would survive to bear witness.

Top and bottom: Bosniak Refugees desperately attempt to enter the UN safe zone at Potočari.

Photo credit: Amel Emric/Exodus.

Remembering Srebrenica 53

EASTERN BOSNIA

The Courage to Speak Out Hasan Nuhanović

Hasan Nuhanović was 24 years old when the war broke out. Returning home to Eastern Bosnia, he was a translator for the UN when Serb forces took Srebrenica in July 1995. Forced to translate the order to send his family away, he never saw them again. He has dedicated his life to seeking truth and justice.

I come from Vlasenica, a little town in Eastern Bosnia, near Srebrenica. When the war broke out, I was in my fourth year in Sarajevo, studying mechanical engineering.

Many people were talking about leaving the country, but it was not an option for my parents. My brother was 17 and still at school. My father Ibro was managing a company of 500 employees in Vlasenica, half of them Serb. When I told him we had to prepare for war and suggested leaving the country he said: “No, I have to look after my employees”. Most people were a bit naïve, and thought everything would be resolved in a few weeks. When we finally decided to leave Bosnia, it was too late to get out.

By April 1992, we feared for our lives. On live TV, we saw the aftermath of the massacre in Bijeljina by Arkan, the notorious Serb commander. On the 6th or 7th of April, we had 54 Remembering Srebrenica

“The year April 1992 to April 1993 was the worst experience of our lives. ” driven to Zvornik and my father’s car was the only car on the road. The day after we left, we heard about the horrific massacre in Zvornik.

I told my father to drive to Sarajevo. I thought that being in the capital would provide us with some protection. The CNN and the BBC were in Sarajevo. The world was watching.

But a Serb colleague of my father’s told him “Ibro, don’t take your family to Sarajevo.

THE RESISTERS—EASTERN BOSNIA

Sarajevo will be erased from the ground.” So my father said we should go to the mountains, to the village where he was born. The Serb attack came in June: my first experience of war.

It was horrible. Military aircraft from Serbia bombed the villages and went back to Serbia to reload. You couldn’t see the jets, they were too fast, but you could hear them. It was hell on earth for a few days, but we were protected by the deep forest. They couldn’t see us.

The year April 1992 to April 1993 was the worst experience of our lives. Worse than July 1995, even though that is when my family was killed. The suffering was extreme. We were

stuck in the mountains, with no food, starving.

We moved to those villages that were able to defend themselves, and decided to move towards Srebrenica in September 1992. We couldn’t go by road, so we had to climb down steep cliffs at night, then go downriver by boat. When dawn came, the shelling started again from Serbia, but somehow we survived, walking to Srebrenica on foot. But when we arrived, we realised we were stuck again.

Srebrenica was besieged. They were bombing the town—by artillery, from the air—for six months. People would go to their burned, destroyed villages and take cattle food out

“We loved the Canadians. We loved the UN. And we thought: maybe, we are not going to die.”

Top: Grave stones at the Srebrenica Memorial Ground. Bottom: Remains of the UN base at Potočari.

Photo credit: Richard Vize.

Remembering Srebrenica 55

THE RESISTERS—EASTERN BOSNIA

Hasan Hasanović, Saliha Osmanović and Hasan Nuhanović attending a memorial event organised by Remembering Srebrenica.

of their silos to eat. We were starving. Even though the Srebrenica fighters were trying to hold Serb forces back from the town, by March 1993 it became clear that they could no longer hold the lines.

On the very day that we thought the Serbs would take the town and massacre us all, we heard on the radio that the UN Security Council had declared Srebrenica a safe area.

We didn’t know what a UN safe area meant, but the word “safe” sounded promising. The next day, when the Canadians arrived, was the first day in a year that people dared to walk out in the street. I had tears in my eyes, we all did. We loved the Canadians. We loved the UN. And we thought: maybe, we are not going to die.

The UN’s arrival froze the genocide that was taking place against the Bosniak people.

We knew that if the Serbs attacked Srebrenica again, and the UN didn’t stop them, there would undoubtedly be another massacre.

When the UN called for NATO air strikes to stop the attack on the “safe area” of Gorazde in 1994, we thought the UN would do the same if anything happened in Srebrenica.

That is why, when July 1995 came, everyone 56 Remembering Srebrenica

“The Dutch told me: ‘Tell your family to leave. They can’t stay here anymore.’

I never saw them again.” expected to hear the sound of NATO jets until the moment when the town finally fell.

The attack started on 6 July. I’d been translating for the UN, but had promised my parents I would collect my brother if it looked like the town would fall, so I went under heavy fire to fetch him. He was the first civilian inside the UN base at Potočari. My parents arrived with the big crowd of older men, women and children that came to the base when the town fell. They were some of the first to arrive so they managed to get inside the base. 25,000 others were not so lucky, and were left outside when the Dutch closed the gates.

THE RESISTERS—EASTERN BOSNIA

When the Serbs arrived on 12 July, they separated all the men and boys from outside the base, and deported all the women and girls, but they did not enter the base itself.

I thought we would be safe inside, but then the Dutch soldiers told those inside the base to get out. Under the UN flag, 5,000 refugees were marched to the gate one by one, where the Serbs took the men and boys to their deaths. My family was one of the last to leave. The Dutch told me: “Tell your family to leave. They can’t stay here anymore.” I never saw them again.

From that day until today, 23 years later, I have needed to find out what happened to my family, and to the other people who were missing. At first I wasn’t even thinking about justice. I just wanted to find out what happened. I was begging the government of the Netherlands to tell me, and to start an investigation into those who had made the decision to turn the refugees out at Potočari, but they wouldn’t engage with me. They said I was too emotional, too loud. Then finally a

“Even after 23 years, our story is still not finished.”

Dutch lawyer came to me and said “I’ll represent you”. We didn’t expect to win, but I wanted to get to truth. We couldn’t establish the truth any other way, so we would try and do it in the courtroom.

It took ten years, and so many obstacles to get to the final judgement that we both nearly gave up, but we never did. The final verdict, from the Supreme Court of the Netherlands, was all in Dutch but I remember looking over at the lawyer and she was smiling. It was the first time ever that a government had been found liable for its troops on a UN mission. I didn’t feel victory, or even satisfaction. I just felt relieved that this fight was over. I was thinking about my parents, and my brother. I was doing this for them. What else could I have done?

My father was identified ten years after he was killed in the genocide. Like most victims, he was identified by the International Commission for Missing Persons using DNA. My brother and mother were identified after fifteen years. All three of them are buried in the graveyard at Potočari. I’ve had to fight so long and so hard just to find out what happened, who was responsible, even to establish the Memorial Centre where they are buried.

Even after 23 years, our story is still not finished.

The names of the more than 8000 victims of genocide at the Srebrenica Memorial site in Potočari.

Photo credit: Richard Vize.

Remembering Srebrenica 57

EASTERN BOSNIA

The Courage of a Child

Elvisa Avdić

Elvisa Avdić was ten years old when the war broke out.

Having fled to Srebrenica, she was one of the last to leave Potočari when Bosnian Serb forces took the town. Elvisa returned to Srebrenica after the war and courageously spoke out about being a child survivor of genocide.

I was born in 1982 in the village of Donje Peći, in the municipality of Srebrenica.

I lived with my mother, grandmother and older sister. My father was away working in Belgrade, and my brother was in high school there. When the war broke out, they couldn’t get back to us—others tried the journey but they were killed at the border.

I was ten when the war started. I didn’t even know what war was. First there were pictures on Croatian TV of soldiers and convoys of vehicles. Then helicopters, then army vehicles. We didn’t know how to react.

Then the columns of refugees came fleeing Serb forces. We heard stories of shooting and killing, but I didn’t really understand until they came to our village.

It was around 11 May 1992 when a tank started firing at our school. We escaped to the woods. In the chaos, I lost my mother.

I was absolutely terrified, ten years old, 58 Remembering Srebrenica

all alone. I didn’t know what to do. I found my neighbours and went with them to a neighbouring village. It was three days before my mother found me and we went back to our village.

My grandmother had suffered a stroke the day after the attack and passed away.

We stayed until Serb forces attacked again, killing my other grandmother and two of my cousins, then we left and never went back.

We stayed in different villages in others’ homes for a year. The village was under daily

“I was ten when the war started.

I didn’t even know what war was.”

THE RESISTERS—EASTERN BOSNIA

fire, but every day I had to take our cow to pasture, sneaking along and hiding to avoid the grenades.

In spring 1993 there was another offensive and we came to Srebrenica. I had a rash all over my body from the poisonous agents that we had been shelled with from Serbia. We hid in my mother’s uncle’s house with 50 other people. In every room there was a whole family.

Somehow, we managed to survive. We had no

“We escaped to the woods. In the chaos, I lost my mother.

I was absolutely terrified, ten years old, all alone.”

food. The thing I remember most vividly was constant hunger, bread with no salt made from oats, that prickles when you eat it. But still we managed to be kids, playing, sledging, going to a makeshift school.

For a while, we had peace. Then July 1995 came. In early July, the shooting started. We heard the Serb forces were in the town, and people were going to Potočari. My mum was so frightened she forgot her shoes. When we got to the base, we were on the second floor of the factory. There were so many people. The first floor was full of the wounded. It was so, so cold at night—we had nothing with us; no food, no blankets. I was just shivering in my mother’s lap.

After two or three nights, we were the last ones to leave. We got on the bus, not knowing where they were taking us. From the bus I saw Bosnian prisoners sitting near Kravica. I can barely remember anything else from that journey, but eventually they told us to get off the bus and to go on foot to Kladanj, in the

Panorama of Srebrenica. Photo credit: Samum/Wikimedia Commons.

Remembering Srebrenica 59

THE RESISTERS—EASTERN BOSNIA

The River Drina, where Bosnia borders Serbia. Photo credit: Julian Nitzch/Wikimedia Commons.

free territory of Bosnia. It was pitch black outside. We started to walk, but a Serb soldier shouted “HALT!” I was so afraid, I couldn’t move. But he just told us to help the older people, who couldn’t walk the few kilometres to the front.

When we arrived, there were crowds of refugees from Srebrenica. As buses came to take people to refugee centres and schools around Tuzla, I noticed my mother was starting to behave irrationally. She refused to get on the bus, believing that they were Serbs who would take us to concentration camps and kill us. I wanted to get on the bus, but I couldn’t leave her. All day, she was talking, talking, talking, and I couldn’t understand her.

Finally, she told me it would be better if we jumped in the river than get caught by the Serbs. I tried to convince her that it wasn’t true and we really were safe, but it was too late— she grabbed my arm and tried to drag me to the river. I grabbed onto a tree, but she jumped in. I was screaming for help. Five men came and somehow managed to get her out. They 60 Remembering Srebrenica

“I did not have a childhood, I was not a teenager, and I will never have a normal life. All because of the war.” gave her coffee, which seemed to reach her somehow. She said, “Look, real coffee! There is no such thing at our place in Srebrenica”. That night they took her to a psychiatric hospital while I went to look for my sister.

When I look back, I wonder how I could have been so brave as a child. Now I have three children of my own, I am terrified. I can’t imagine how my mother survived on her own with me and my sister. Although she came

THE RESISTERS—EASTERN BOSNIA

out of hospital after a month, she was never the same again. My sister’s husband survived the fall of Srebrenica, but so many men never returned. My brother came home from Belgrade in 1999, but my father stayed there. I did not have a childhood, I was not a teenager, and I will never have a normal life. All because of the war.

Even after all that has happened, I live in Srebrenica and I have the strength to look in the eyes of those people who ruined my life. We returned to Srebrenica because we didn’t want to live in refugee camps, where we had nothing. Although we knew it would be difficult, we had a strong resolve to return home. We thought that the war was over forever, and most survivors would come back, but that didn’t happen.

Life in Srebrenica is very complicated for everyone, but especially for those who survived genocide. After the horror we went through, we are faced with almost daily denial of what we survived. Along with ordinary problems, we have politicians who want division and who support war criminals.

Bosniaks were the majority here, but now we are in the minority, and through daily obstructions the authorities are trying to force us to leave this area forever. Every day here is a struggle, especially for our family because of my husband Nedžad’s experiences—he was one of the very few that survived the mass executions.

I teach my children not to hate, but they have to know what happened here.

If they cannot learn these things at school, we must teach them at home. When I first told my story, I was not aware of the depth of what I had survived. Living here, I realise how important it is to speak out. Every single story is deep and special and deserves to be heard, because every story is somebody’s life. Faced with denial, our duty is to remind people of Srebrenica’s horrible past. Even if it is too late for us who survived, maybe others can learn from our experiences.

Elvisa with her husband Nedžad and daughters Dzejlana (left) and Nadža (right).

“Every single story is deep and special and deserves to be heard, because every story is somebody’s life.”

Remembering Srebrenica 61

Central

Bosniaand Herzegovina The War Within a War Central Bosnia and Herzegovina saw “a war within a war” in 1993 and 1994. At first, the Croatian Defence Council (HVO) and the Army of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina (ABiH) were allied against Bosnian Serb forces, but this alliance broke down and war broke out between the two parties in central Bosnia and spread south to Herzegovina.

12 November 1991 April–June 1992 Bosnian Croat party leaders declare the autonomous Croatian Community of Herzeg-Bosnia.

Although no secessionary goal is announced, resulting tension with the ABiH contributes to the Croat-Bosniak war.

62 Remembering RememberingSrebrenica Srebrenica

The Serb-dominated Yugoslav People’s Army and paramilitary forces take eastern Mostar and hold it for two months. They are eventually driven out of Mostar by the alliance between the HVO and the ABiH.

Croatia

BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA Central Region

16 April 1993

Beginning of Bosniak-Croat war. Croat forces attack towns in the Lašva Valley, aiming to drive out Bosnian Muslims and create “Croatian provinces”.

The largest massacre is at Ahmići, killing 120.

Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Jajce

AHMIĆI

120 1993

STUPNI DO

37 1993

MOSTAR

2000 1993

RESISTING DIVISION: YOUNG PEOPLE IN JAJCE

In the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, education is divided by the “two schools under one roof” system.

However young people in Jajce, central Bosnia-Herzegovina, have successfully protested against the division of their school. Nicolas Rímac, one of the organisers of the protest, said: “We live in harmony. Between us young people there are no religious or nationalistic divides. We judge people on their character, nothing else.”

DEFENDING THE DEFENCELESS

Heliodrom

Republika Srpska

Dretelj Stolac

Gabela

Dr Zlatko Hrvić, a Muslim doctor, was the Director of a local psychiatric hospital until the end of April 1992. When the Yugoslav National Army took Mostar, he risked his own life to protect 158 of his patients that were not capable of taking care of themselves, arranging food and supplies and eventually their evacuation, saving their lives. A year later, during the Croat-Muslim conflict, he was saved from the Croatian Defence Forces by his neighbour, a Croat.

STANDING UP TO HATE: STOLAC YOUTH FORUM

Concentration Camp

9 May 1993

Town

Siege of Mostar. The HVO expel thousands of Muslims into east Mostar and start sniping, shelling and blocking humanitarian aid. Mostar bridge destroyed on 9 November 1993.

Illustration: Jannah Haque

The Forum fights against daily expressions of hatred and intolerance in divided Stolac, such as the illegal flag of the Croat wartime state— a symbol of so-called “ethnic cleansing”.

July–August 1993

HVO forces carry out ethnic cleansing against Muslims in Stolac, destroying the old town. Muslim prisoners are taken to concentration camps where they are beaten and tortured by HVO forces.

12 April 1994

Siege of Mostar ends following the Washington Agreement on 18 March 1994, creating the Federation of BosniaHerzegovina. Allied HVO and ABiH forces re-take large amounts of territory.

Remembering Srebrenica 63

CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

Croatian Nationalism and

The War Within a War The declaration of Croatian independence on 25 June 1991 marked a key victory for Croatian nationalist leader Franjo Tuđman, and would spark war between Croatia and the Serbdominated rump of Yugoslavia. As Croatian Serbs, targeted by Croatian nationalist reforms and inflamed by anti-Croat propaganda from Belgrade, mounted violent resistance to Croatian independence. The battle between these two nationalist powers would ultimately tear Bosnia apart, as Croatia and Serbia tried to annex parts of the country.

As Bosnia prepared for its independence referendum, Bosnian Croats in Herzegovina declared the “Croatian Community of HerzegBosnia”. At first, Croatia’s intention towards this entity was unclear—Tuđman encouraged Bosnian Croats to participate in Bosnia’s independence referendum and, when war broke out, a Croat-Bosniak alliance was swiftly

formed to resist “ethnic cleansing” by Bosnian Serb forces. However, the question of the Croatian Community of Herzeg-Bosnia, and Croatia’s ultimate intentions towards Bosnian territory, remained difficult, and by early 1993 the alliance had begun to break down.

The first clashes took place in January 1993, and tensions between the parties continued to grow until early April 1993 when the Bosnian Croat leadership met in Mostar to discuss the creating of “Croatian Provinces”. On 16 April 1993, a wave of violence was unleashed along

“Of the 120 victims of the massacre, the youngest was a three month old baby, machine gunned to death in his crib.”

UN medics take away dead bodies in the aftermath of the Ahmići massacre. Photo credit: ICTY/Wikimedia Commons.

64 Remembering Srebrenica

THE RESISTERS—CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

Top and Bottom: Before and After—The Old Bridge in Mostar was destroyed in 1993 during the siege of the city and was rebuilt with international support in 2005.

Top photo credit: Npatm/Wikimedia Commons.

were rounded up, and the men separated and put into detention facilities at the Heliodrom camp. Their families were driven into East Mostar, where heavy shelling killed many civilians and wreaked destruction.

Even in these dangerous conditions, the Jewish community continued to bring aid to the besieged Muslims, until the complete destruction of Mostar bridge in November 1993, cutting East Mostar off completely.

This same pattern was unfolding in other municipalities in the region, including Stolac, with men being separated and taken to the Dretelj, Gabela and Ljubuški prisons, as well as the Heliodrom concentration camp. Conditions were horrific—filthy, with no sanitation, little food and no medical assistance. Men were repeatedly beaten, tortured and even used as human shields on the frontline.

By early 1994, the Croat-Bosniak conflict was at a stalemate. Under increasing international pressure, the Washington Agreement was signed on 18 March 1994, restoring the military alliance and forming the basis for the Federation that forms 51% of Bosnia today. From a military perspective, the alliance started the final phase of the war, and by the summer of 1995, the combined forces had reduced the territorial area controlled

by Bosnian Serb forces from 70% to 50%, laying the groundwork for the Dayton Peace Agreement and the long road to building peace.

the Lašva Valley, culminating in the village of Ahmići. The main roads were blocked, and the village was attacked by Croat forces, driving the Muslim population south out of the village, where they were targeted by expert marksmen.

Men were dragged out of their homes and shot dead, and their homes set ablaze, killing those hiding inside. Of the 120 victims of the massacre, the youngest was a three month old baby, machine gunned to death in his crib. British peacekeepers, under the command of Col. Bob Stewart, discovered the massacre two days later. The charred remains were barely recognisable as human.

In May 1993, the HVO launched a major attack in Mostar, where the ABiH was headquartered. Muslim The Mosque in Ahmići was destroyed during the massacre. inhabitants of West Mostar Photo credit: ICTY/Wikimedia Commons.

Remembering Srebrenica 65

CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

The Courage to Build Bridges Zoran Mandlbaum Mostar’s most recognisable feature is perhaps its bridges.

The most famous of these is the Stari Most. Zoran Mandlbaum was one of the last people to cross the bridge before it was destroyed, whilst bringing aid to the Muslims trapped on the East bank of the city.

Zoran Mandlbaum passed away on 9 November 2015. Before his death, he told his story to the Post Conflict Research Centre for their documentary series “Ordinary Heroes”. Here, we share his powerful story.

“Many Jews came to Bosnia-Herzegovina with the arrival of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1878. My great grandfather, Josef Mandlbaum, came to Foća. He settled in a little place called Jelah where his three children were born. In 1905, they moved to Mostar, where they built a large apartment building and opened the Hotel Neretva.

I was born in 1946, my brother in 1948.

During World War II, both my mother and father were Partisans. Before that they were detained in a concentration camp in Rab (off the coast of Croatia). Those images of my mother and father have remained with me my entire life. My mother was from Sarajevo and her whole family were killed in the Holocaust.

1992 caught us all here in Mostar by surprise. The Yugoslav National Army 66 Remembering Srebrenica

“Zoran refused to accept this state of affairs, and became a living bridge between East and West Mostar.” was headquartered opposite where I live now. In April 1992, after the explosion of an oil tank, some people arrived in black uniforms. They were wearing fascist symbols with pictures of Pavelić and Artuković (fascist leaders from WW2 Croatia), men who committed terrible atrocities during World War II. As President of the Jewish Community, I didn’t know what was taking place. I didn’t know what would happen to the Jews.

Photo credit (above): Post Conflict Research Centre.

THE RESISTERS—CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

The war first started in Croatia. It began as a civil war, when Croatia adopted the new constitution that declared it was a country for Catholic Croats and defined all other non-Catholic groups as minorities. When Orthodox people, predominantly Serb,

“I organised humanitarian convoys carrying packages, which were made by citizens on the west bank, for friends, relatives, and citizens living on the east side of town.”

were assigned minority status in the new constitution, war broke out.”

When the Bosnian war broke out in the spring of 1992, Serb controlled forces and paramilitaries held the town for two months. At first, Mostar was defended by an alliance of Croat and Muslim forces. Zoran explained how that alliance broke down, starting a war within a war between the former allies “On May 9, 1993, this crazy idea arrived, initiated by Tuđjman, the Croatian President. There were talks that this part of Bosnia-Herzegovina, which was majority Croat, was to become part of Croatia. Tuđjman realised his creation could not consist of a 50–50% Croat-Muslim population. That’s when the persecution of Muslims in Mostar began.”

The Croat army, the HVO, started driving Muslims out of their apartments and into East Mostar, where they were besieged by heavy shelling and gunfire. Zoran refused to accept this state of affairs, and became a living bridge between East and West Mostar.

“There was a list of apartments where Muslims were living. I organised humanitarian

A ruined building in Mostar. Photo credit: Martijn Munneke/Wikimedia Commons.

Remembering Srebrenica 67

THE RESISTERS—CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

convoys carrying packages, which were made by citizens on the west bank, for friends, relatives, and citizens living on the east side of town.

I would get up at 7.30 and go to the UNPROFOR base in Medugorje in my car. It was the road to salvation, because it was the only road that led out of Mostar to Croatia. The humanitarian work I did all started and ended there. I would arrive Arial shot of ruined buildings in Mostar. Photo credit: SSGT Ceasar/ back in Mostar with a car Wikimedia Commons. carrying letters, food and medicine and would stay overnight on the other side.

I think I may have been one of the last people to cross the old bridge before it was destroyed. I managed to get across the bridge that night. The bridge consisted of three arches—the first arch was destroyed, but the second and third were still standing.

I got up at five in the morning and passed back over to the east bank, and went to the UNPROFOR base in Medugorje to fetch aid.

When I got back to Mostar, I heard that the bridge was destroyed.”

Those humanitarian aid packages were a lifeline to the besieged and starving Zoran Mandlbaum. Photo credit: Post Conflict Muslims in Eastern Mostar. Janja Veljković Research Centre. was one of many people on the East Bank to whom Zoran brought desperately needed “It was May 30th, which marked Croatia’s aid. She recalls: Statehood Day, when they realised, “One day, I walked out into my courtyard, and especially the Croat commander Misic, there was Zoran! It was as if God was watching that they couldn’t stop me because my over us. There was no one else I would have will to help people was too strong. So they rather seen in that moment than Zoran. Up placed a bomb under my car. It exploded, walks Zoran, carrying a half-loaf of bread damaging surrounding cars. My first wrapped in paper, and we were desperately thought was about how I would have died hungry. I never thought I would see anyone if I’d been inside that car.” else from the other side of town. When Zoran Even the attempt on his life didn’t stop showed up, my faith was restored.”

Zoran from trying to help people. From Not everyone appreciated Zoran’s bringing letters and aid packages to the willingness to help the desperate civilians of Muslims imprisoned in the Heliodrom Eastern Mostar. In May 1994, Zoran realised camp, to smuggling people of all ethnicities how far the Croatian Army leadership was who were at risk of torture, rape and murder willing to go to stop his humanitarian efforts: over the border into Croatia, Zoran did 68 Remembering Srebrenica

THE RESISTERS—CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

everything in his power to help his fellow human beings, explaining: “When I see an injustice being done to someone, I’m the kind of man who just wants to help that person overcome it and feel better. So, just an ordinary man, willing to help anyone he can help.”

“When I see an injustice being done to someone, I’m the kind of man who just wants to help that person overcome it and feel better.”

Reconstruction of the old bridge in Mostar started in 2004, but bridges between people in the city are yet to be forged. A fitting monument to the moral courage of Zoran Mandlbaum is to act on his call to build bridges between the communities of BosniaHerzegovina, and to resist division: “We, the national minorities, are fighting for a unified Bosnia-Herzegovina. I fought for years against being labelled as a minority.

I do not feel like one. I am a Herzegovinan citizen practising the Jewish religion. We all eat the same food and go to the same schools.

We all socialise together and go to the same events. It bothers me that there is a law that categorises Jews as a national minority.

History didn’t teach us anything. This system of division is distancing our children from the idea of a unified Bosnia-Herzegovina. We cannot move forward without the truth, and without the truth there is no reconciliation.

Take this journey with me, face the things people do not wish to remember, so that our children will know what happened in this city.”

Mostar Old Town. Photo credit: Ramirez/Wikimedia Commons.

Remembering Srebrenica 69

CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

The Courage to Protect Fadila Kapic-Mehmedbašić

Raised with stories of the heroism of her father, a human rights activist murdered in World War II, when war came again to Stolac, Fadila followed in his footsteps, courageously saving her Bosnian Serb neighbours from the soldiers.

If you were born and raised in a family where good deeds were an everyday occurrence and simply just a way of life, then it’s incredibly hard, almost impossible, to only single out a few instances of humanity. However, if my stories are able to teach someone the wrong of their ways, if it helps to put a stop to certain wrong doings, I will gladly bare my heart.

I grew up with only my mother and grandfather. My father’s face isn’t even imprinted in my mind since he was shot and murdered a month before the 1944 liberation of Stolac. He was only 37 years old, and I was merely a toddler. Despite not having any of my own memories of 70 Remembering Srebrenica

him, his spirit was kept alive with the stories that my family and the people of Stolac would share with me. His constant presence in my life encouraged me to follow in his footsteps. I forgave him for leaving me so early on, because as well as his

“If my life can save two other lives, then I gladly give mine.”

THE RESISTERS—CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

“My father’s spirit was kept alive with the stories that my family and the people of Stolac would share with me.”

these wars are a common recurrence.

In 1941, 196 innocent people of Serbian descent were murdered and thrown in a mass grave by the Ustaša (Croatian fascists). Many of the citizens that were revered throughout the town turned a blind eye to this massacre, even the mayor of Stolac. My father, Abdullah Mehmedbašić, was the exception.

My father made every possible effort to be a source of comfort and support for the women and children left behind after the massacre. He invested everything he could, financially and emotionally.

He was jailed eleven times, but that didn’t hinder him from his cause, and it never once stopped him from listening indirect presence in my life, he gifted me to his heart. His father and family often an incredible role model. He left behind his warned him that he would end up dead life philosophy and wisdom. due to his passionate activism. His Stolac, a small town in Herzegovina, is response would always be,“If my life can not only beautiful because of its stunning save two other lives, then I gladly give landscape, but because of the spirit of the mine.” In 1942 he went to eastern Bosnia people. Various civilizations have passed and rescued thirty-six orphans, whose through, coming from east to west and parents had been killed by the fascists vice versa, all leaving remnants behind. and brought them back to Stolac. The Unfortunately a number of wars have kids were all carefully placed in loving taken away a piece of that beauty, and homes with families eager to give these children a second chance in life. All of these children ended up outliving my father, Abdullah, and all became upstanding citizens of Stolac.

Before the liberation of Stolac in October 1944, Germans and Ustaša, gathered all the surviving family members left behind from the previous massacre of Serbs, and threw them on a truck. This truck took them to Jasenovac, a concentration camp. The only man amongst this group of women and children was my father Abdullah. They say the truck was filled with screams of terror.

The landscape of Stolac. Photo credit: Martin Brož/Wikimedia Commons.

Bystanders simply watched Remembering Srebrenica 71

THE RESISTERS—CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

The city of Stolac. Photo credit: Anto Quahadi/Wikimedia Commons.

the truck pass by. My father began to sing a popular folklore song, to calm others and possibly calm himself. That truck was then filled with screams, cries, and a hopeful song.

The soldiers removed my father from the truck about fifteen kilometres outside of Stolac. He was held captive in a mosque with three other like-minded men, who had diligently fought for basic human rights for their neighbours, not caring if they were Muslim, Serb or Croat, just that they were human. They were shot dead the fourth day after their capture. The few people who escaped from the truck and train heading to the concentration camp were able to witness my father’s bravery and last moments, and share stories of his heroism. He was not a Communist. He was a practising Muslim, who understood the fundamentals of Islam and was able to uphold the words of the Qur’an.

72 Remembering Srebrenica

In the 1990s, another war was plaguing Bosnia. This time there weren’t any Germans or Italians involved. No, this time it was a fight among brothers. Before you knew it, people from Stolac were fleeing for

“If it must be, then we will die together because Stolac without you, and Stolac without me, wouldn’t be the Stolac we have grown to love.”

THE RESISTERS—CENTRAL BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

“I sat in the hallway of my home, determined and still.

No one was going to make their way to the basement. If they did, they would have to kill me first.”

Fadila refused to succumb to hatred during the conflict and protected her neighbours regardless of their religion.

their lives. Serbians went to “Serbian” areas, Croatians to “Croatian” areas. Even though there were a few Serbs escaping, the majority decided to stay in Stolac.

With the memories of the last war still in their mind, they chose to stand their ground, even if it cost them their lives.

Stolac had reached its lowest point, with Croats rounding up and taking their Serb neighbours to be executed, all because of differing religions. With all of this happening around me, I remembered my father’s words, “If my life can save two others, then I gladly give mine.” I decided to hide fourteen women and children, all of Serbian descent, in my basement.

My honourable neighbour, Petko Nikolić, who refused to join the Bosnian Serb Army, was reluctant to come to my house with his wife and children. Why? He was scared that their presence would cost me my life and my family’s lives. I reassured him, “My dear neighbour, we have lived together in this town. It has never bothered your mother nor your father that we both have different religions, so if it must be, then we will die together.

Because Stolac without you, and Stolac without me, wouldn’t be the Stolac we have grown to love.” I sat in the hallway of my home, determined and still. No one was going to make their way to the basement. If they did, they would have to kill me first.

Various armies, war criminals, neighbours, and strangers all came to pass through Stolac. It was then I truly saw how people can become bloodthirsty animals. Some came purely to steal, not to kill. I’m certain these soldiers knew about the Serbs I was hiding in my basement, but when they reported back to their superiors, they claimed to have found nothing. The neighbours that I hid in my basement all survived, thank God. One by one, they returned to their desolate and besieged homes, and began to rebuild not only their homes, but their lives.

Remembering Srebrenica 73

Refuge THE RESISTERS

More than 2 million people were displaced during the war in Bosnia in the 1990s, seeking refuge all over the world.

Bosnian refugees have rebuilt their lives with dignity and courage, despite the difficulties of starting over in a new country.

UK & IRELAND

10,000

Many have used their experiences to help refugees from all around the world— building bridges not walls.

CANADA

20,000

Others have spoken out against hatred and prejudice, in an effort to educate future generations.

The courage of Bosnian refugees has been met by the courage and compassion from

USA

120,000

UK citizens to welcome them.

74 Remembering Srebrenica

As quoted by OECD and BiH UK Network.

SWEDEN

58,700

DENMARK

17,000

GERMANY

320,000

AUSTRIA

86,500 CROATIA

SWITZERLAND

NETHERLANDS

22,000

24,500

BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA

SERBIA

AUSTRALIA

27,000 Illustration: Jannah Haque

BOSNIANS IN THE UK

The Courage to Start Over Amra Dautović

Amra Dautović came to the UK as a child refugee during the Bosnian War. Arriving to the country without speaking a word of English she now has a Masters Degree in Forensic Psychology.

I was born in Foča, Eastern Bosnia, where I spent the first three years of my life before moving to Sarajevo. I have very fond and happy memories of my childhood before the war, summers in the countryside, and time with lots of members of our large family. My father worked away a lot, so I spent most of my time with my mum and sister in Sarajevo.

We played in the streets with the kids from the neighbourhood, and it was safe.

But all of that changed when war broke out. My childhood was short lived and robbed from me by war.

I was in Foča when the war broke out, visiting my uncle and aunt to spend time with them before school started but my parents were still in Sarajevo. I ended up being separated from them for a year and a half.

I remember the days in the run up to the war, there was definitely a shift in 76 Remembering Srebrenica

“We started to sleep in our clothes, so we would always be ready to run.” atmosphere that I didn’t really understand at the time. The adults were concerned.

They were constantly watching the news and talking about politics. Sometimes, my cousins and I would take our uncle’s binoculars to a field overlooking a valley.

From there we could see people on the other side digging bunkers and storing weapons.

Then people from the surrounding areas started arriving to our village. They told us stories of their houses and farms

THE RESISTERS—BOSNIANS IN THE UK

being burned down and they had had to flee. After that, we started to sleep in our clothes, so we would always be ready to run.

One night, our neighbour came and started banging on our window shouting “They’re coming! They’re coming! Get up we have to go!”. We took only what we could carry with us and the clothes we were sleeping in. We fled the village with my aunt and her daughters, but my uncle had to stay behind. That was the last time I saw him, and to this day we still haven’t located his remains.

The Clocktower in Foča, Eastern Bosnia. Amra was born in Foča and was there visiting relatives when the war broke out. Photo credit: Julian Nitzche/Wikimedia Commons.

We walked for miles to a place called Jabuka where we ended up in a sports hall of some sorts. We slept in an abandoned house and I remember the adults discussing what was happening in the rest of the region and where we should go next but I was desperate to go back to Sarajevo so I could be re-united with my parents.

We travelled on foot to Sarajevo, over mountains, and going from village to village staying in abandoned houses on the way. It was both incredibly beautiful in the mountains and incredibly scary as we were attacked numerous times on our journey. We had to shelter from air raids and would emerge to the most horrifying destruction. One day, we tried to get a bus but couldn’t get on it for some reason so we waited for it to come back but it never did. Later we found out that all the passengers on that particular bus had been killed.

I sometimes think the only way we were able to survive was because of the kindness of others. People took us in to their homes and shared what little they had with us.

I remember people being very kind.

“The only way we were able to survive was because of the kindness of others.

People took us in to their homes and shared what little they had with us.”

Remembering Srebrenica 77

THE RESISTERS—BOSNIANS IN THE UK

We eventually made it across the mountains to a small town just outside Sarajevo called Tarčin. We had food because we grew vegetables in the garden, we collected wood from the near-by forests, we went to school and even celebrated Eid. But the impact of war was never far away.

I remember a day where lots of women came through the town, some of them looked like zombies and later I overheard the adults talking about how they had been captured and detained by Bosnian Serb forces who raped the young girls. It was so sad to be aware of something so hideous at that tender age, the war had stolen my innocence from me.

All of the time we were in Tarčin, I wished I could dig a tunnel to Sarajevo to see my mum and dad. I had no idea if they were

Amra (right) with her mother and sister.

78 Remembering Srebrenica

alive or dead or even what was happening to them. Finally, after everything, we made it to my parent’s house in Sarajevo. At first I couldn’t recognise my mum, dad or sister and I just remember we cried a lot when we were reunited.

Living in occupied Sarajevo was very hard. We were house bound because we couldn’t go out as the city was under sniper fire. I couldn’t go to school because it was too dangerous. Children were killed just walking to school.

“The war had stolen my innocence from me..”

THE RESISTERS—BOSNIANS IN THE UK

children and having to keep them constantly sheltered from all that is going on around them.

It’s heart-breaking.

Although it took some time to settle, living in the UK provided my family and I with an opportunity to make new lives for ourselves. When we first arrived, we got support with housing and education. My dad was injured during the war but received amazing care from the NHS and made Amra at her graduation with her proud family. Despite not speaking English on her arrival in the UK, Amra now has a Masters Degree in Forensic Psychology. a good recovery. I will always be grateful for this.

It is always difficult to be the new child at school but even more so if you do not speak the same language as your classmates and teachers. However, I found myself picking up English quite quickly, with support from a Bosnian organisation based in the UK that helped with language lessons and provided interpreters. I suppose being young helped as well.

I have had the chance to pursue a wonderful education in the UK and secure my dream job as the Managing Director of a mental health support charity, although my Death was never far away. My dad was biggest achievement in life are my two on the front line, so we would always be young children. I have all this because my scared and just hope that he would come family had the courage to start again in a back alive, and then my aunt who I had new country. However, this does not mean been living with during the start of the the pain has gone away. war was killed. She was standing in line for We lost a lot of family in the war. bread when a grenade fell and killed her.

We only recently found my grandfather That was the first time I had experienced and uncle’s remains: we didn’t know how direct loss, it was devastating because she or where they were killed and we still was like a second mother to me. haven’t got justice for their deaths over As an adult, I now realise what my 20 years later. A lot of us were displaced family went through and especially how from our homes, my immediate family the women had to survive. I witnessed my and I are in the UK, my aunt is in France, mum having to stay home and look after my Uncle was in Germany. all of us, making food with no ingredients, My message for everyone is to appreciate washing blood-soaked clothes without their lives, enjoy it and cherish your family detergent or a washing machine, protecting and loved ones because time is truly precious.

“I couldn’t go to school because it was too dangerous.

Children were killed just walking to school.”

Remembering Srebrenica 79

BOSNIANS IN THE UK

The Courage to Remember Safet Vukalić

Safet Vukalić was a teenager when the genocidal project called “ethnic cleansing” began in Prijedor. He was saved from the camps by his mother, who said he was too young to go “with the men”. Safet came to the UK as a refugee and has courageously shared his story to educate about the consequences of hatred and prejudice left unchecked.

Prior to the war we all lived peacefully together. At school, my class was roughly half Muslim and half Serb and other religions, not that most of us paid attention to religious difference. When we had a break, boys would grab a ball and play football— two teams against each other, not divided by religion. We shared everything—the same school, the same entrance, unlike some parts of Bosnia today.

Then came 1992. When the local government in Prijedor was overthrown by the Serbian ‘Democratic’ Party led

by Karadžić, everything went downhill.

Local propaganda on public TV and radio was working nonstop to ensure the Serb population would fear Muslims, or least be confused. All sorts of stories were going around. My favourite was when Prijedor 80 Remembering Srebrenica

“Hate is a virus.

If you don’t treat it, it will spread.”

Radio said all Muslims had received a list of Serbs to kill. I joked that our list got lost in the post. Post was rather unreliable in those days.

One of the instructions given to all “non- Serbs” was to put a white flag outside our houses and to wear white armbands, which is why we wear white armbands each year on 31 May as a reminder, like Jews wearing yellow stars in WWII. Eventually, they started collecting the local population, mainly men.

THE RESISTERS—BOSNIANS IN THE UK

Sometime in June 1992, it was the turn of my part of the town, Donja Puharska.

Armed soldiers with armoured vehicles were going through the streets shouting “All men go to the main road!” They kept saying: “Don’t worry—if you haven’t done anything you will be sent home after questioning.” No one mentioned concentration camps.

My father and brother went. I started walking behind them—at 16, I was taller than most men. My mother shouted ‘You are not going anywhere, you are just a child!

Go inside’. Luckily, I obeyed her and wasn’t

“When we heard that my father had been taken to Omarska, it was the worst day of my life. I went into the bathroom and cried.”

picked up later. If I hadn’t I would have been taken to the camps and I’m not sure I would have survived all the suffering there.

As the men were waiting on the main road some soldiers started beating my father and brother. My father used to be part of the local Joint Territorial Army, so he was next to be beaten, but a soldier from Serbia asked them to stop, as the men had done nothing wrong. My father always says that he would like to find that Serbian soldier and thank him. In that moment, he behaved like a soldier and saved my dad.

At first we didn’t know what had happened to my father and brother, but eventually we found out they were being held locally at Keraterm. Some guards would let food be brought in to the camp for family members, and my sister went whenever she could, taking food to my father and brother. Sometimes she would be threatened.

One of our family friends who was a Serb didn’t want to join the Bosnian Serb Army. He was told not to come to work, threatened and called a traitor by his own friends, just because he didn’t feel like imprisoning innocent people. He stood up for what was right. If only more did.

When we heard that my father had been taken to Omarska, it was the worst day

Safet with other genocide survivors at a Holocaust Memorial Day event.

Remembering Srebrenica 81

THE RESISTERS—BOSNIANS IN THE UK

of my life. I went into the bathroom and cried. I thought he would be killed there for sure, as we had heard people only went to Omarska “on request”, which usually meant torture and death. He was extremely lucky to survive. Later, he was taken to Manjača and eventually to Croatia. In December 1992 he came to the UK with the Red Cross.

In December 1993 I finally saw my dad again for the first time since that Safet with the HRH Prince of Wales. terrible June of 1992. When my older sister and I arrived at the hostel in Balham where my father was staying, none of us could speak for some time.

We were both happy and sad, we were with dad again, and alive, but mum was still in Prijedor with my younger sister.

We weren’t finally reunited as a family until June 1994. We all live here now. All of us ‘kids’ have got jobs and have had jobs for years. It wasn’t easy. It was difficult for me to get back into education. I was told I was too old to continue normal education, and it was a problem that I didn’t speak English. If it wasn’t for my dad meeting a Bosnian family from Zenica, who helped me get into college, who knows what would have happened.

Safet speaking at a Srebrenica Memorial Event in London.

College was hard at first. I started in a part time group to pick up some English and speak, some of the students would laugh. before starting my full time education.

But that was one group. When I started my I remember sometimes when I would try BTEC National Diploma in Engineering in September 1994, things were totally different. There were no issues—we would all play football together and help each other with studies. It probably helped with making friends that maths was my favourite subject and others mostly hated it and needed help!

I first started properly talking about my experience through the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust in 2010, and I’m now also working with Remembering

“It wasn’t easy to speak out in the beginning as emotions were always taking over.”

82 Remembering Srebrenica

THE RESISTERS—BOSNIANS IN THE UK

Srebrenica. It wasn’t easy to speak out in the beginning as emotions were always taking over. If it wasn’t for these two organisations, would I be talking about it at all? Probably not.

For me it is important to talk about what has happened in Bosnia because of what happened, how it happened and the fact that much of it is still happening. In Bosnia war criminals are celebrated as heroes by certain Bosnian politicians. I would like to think people praising Hitler would not be treated so kindly.

“I want my daughters to be proud of what their father did, however small, to help educate people of the consequences of hate.”

Bosnia is still divided, and many are working to ensure division stays in place. Not long ago we had children protesting in Bosnia because adults want to build them a school with separate entrances, by religion. Then we act surprised when we hear acts of hate.

It’s our fault. We are not talking enough about hate. Many think if you ignore it, it will go away.

It won’t. Hate is a virus. If you don’t treat it, it will spread. The past is there to show us—let’s learn from it.

I often ask myself—am I a survivor?

It’s difficult to answer, as I always compare myself to those who have lost family. I was lucky and am lucky.

However, I guess I am a survivor. And I want my daughters to be proud of what their father did, however small, to help educate people of the consequences of hate, ignorance and inaction. No one should go through what I did. It hurts me seeing those things repeat again and again.

When will the world say no more and mean it? Hopefully one day soon.

Safet at a Holocaust Memorial Day event with Former Prime Minister David Cameron, Former Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Former Leader of the Labour Party Ed Milliband.

Remembering Srebrenica 83

Helping Heroes FROM BOSNIA TO THE UK

As scenes from Bosnia unfolded on UK televisions, ordinary citizens from all four corners of the UK were moved to take action to help. Here are their stories.

The Hunt for Justice: Howard Tucker Behind the convictions of war criminals like Ratko Mladić, the Butcher of Bosnia, is a story of slow, patient work and sacrifice by committed investigators like Howard Tucker.

Howard was a detective working in CID in Cardiff, Wales during the conflict.

Appalled by reports of what was happening in BosniaHerzegovina, Howard applied for a post with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia investigating war crimes. The post was initially meant to be a year, but Howard would end up staying

for more than 16 years, becoming head of the ICTY mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Howard’s dedication and passion for bringing the perpetrators of crimes against humanity to justice has contributed to conviction of many of the architects of genocide, including Radovan Karadžić. He said “It was the desire for justice that kept me there. We helped to bring these atrocities to the world’s attention, and hopefully bring some justice for the victims. Now we need to remember, so they will not have died in vain.

Operation Santa: Reggie Donnelly Moved by images of the Bosnian War he had seen on TV and guided by the principles of his Catholic faith, Reggie Donnelly regularly brought joy to children in Bosnia-Herzegovina at Christmas time.

He knew Bosnia well, as he had been organising Catholic pilgrimages to Medjugorje in southern Bosnia since the 1980s.

Originally from West Belfast, Reggie was the driving force behind ‘Operation Santa’ which saw thousands of toys and clothes that were donated in Northern Ireland shipped to 84 Remembering Srebrenica

WALES

NORTHERN IRELAND

Bosnia during the war and in the years that followed.

In the year 2000, Reggie brought 8 children from the Balkans who were in desperate need of medical attention to Northern Ireland. Two of the children were from BosniaHerzegovina and had both lost limbs through accidents with landmines. Reggie was able to find doctors to donate their time and skills to perform the necessary treatment.

Reggie passed away in March 2018, but his legacy of compassion will endure.

Bottom photo credit: The Belfast Telegraph

Welcome to Wincanton: Malcolm MacCormack

ENGLAND

When Malcolm MacCormack, former postmaster of Wincanton, Somerset, saw images of the children affected by the Bosnian war, doing nothing was simply not an option- he had to help. Malcolm immediately started fundraising by putting a notice in the window of the post office and placing a donation bucket on the counter. Thanks to the generosity of the Wincanton community, within two weeks he had raised £10,000. He assembled a team and booked a coach to war-torn Bosnia-Herzegovina. He assembled a team and booked a coach to war-torn BosniaHerzegovina. When the convoy returned to Somerset, he brought six families back with him. Shocked and traumatised, all that the refugees had with them, was a single carrier bag containing their worldly possessions. Malcolm MacCormack and the people of Wincanton show what one small community can do when they refuse to stand by in the face of human suffering.

From Scotland to Sarajevo: Christine Witcutt

In 1993, Christine Witcutt had recently retired as a Primary School teacher and was looking forward to enjoying retirement with her husband Alan. However, these best-laid plans were upended by a letter Christine received from a distressed friend in Kosovo, Top photo credit: Wincanton Window

SCOTLAND

pleading for help on behalf of her husband, who had been imprisoned by Serbs. Christine implored the UK government and Amnesty International to intervene but to no avail.

Undeterred, the Witcutts got involved with Edinburgh Direct Aid (EDA), a local charity that provided emergency supplies to civilians caught in conflict and refugees. In a matter of weeks the couple were headed for Bosnia in an aid lorry. It was on their second convoy to Sarajevo, under siege in a hail of bullets and shells, that Christine was tragically shot and killed in the crossfire.

In memory of Christine’s incredible courage and refusal to stand by, a school for children with special needs was opened in Sarajevo in her name.

Among the funeral tributes was a wreath marked simply “From the People of Sarajevo”.

Remembering Srebrenica 85

Everyday Heroes Standing Up to Hatred in the UK

Photo credit: Darren Staples/Reuters

Photo credit: Office of Mhiari Black MP

Hate crime and hate incidents are still on the rise in the UK. Here we pay tribute to those everyday heroes that stand up and speak out against hatred and division. In the words of Millicent Fawcett, recently honoured with a statue in Parliament Square “Courage Speaks to Courage Everywhere.�

Hatred has no creed Renee Rachel Black and Sadiq Patel

A Jewish woman named Renee Rachel Black and a Muslim man named Sadiq Patel react next to floral tributes in Albert Square in Manchester following the terrorist attacks on concert goers. This photo went viral shortly after it was taken. Many drew strength and inspiration from the message of inter-faith solidarity that this image provides.

86 Remembering Srebrenica

Calling Out Misogyny Mhairi Black MP

In a House of Commons debate, during March 2018, Mhairi Black, MP for Paisley, gave an impassioned speech arguing that misogyny should be treated as a hate crime and bravely shared examples of the personal sexist abuse she receives online.

Photo credit: Joe Giddens/Press Association

THE RESISTERS

Facing Down Hate: Saffiyah Khan

Photo credit: Dinendra Haria/Alamy

In 2017, Saffiyah attended a counter-demonstration that was intended to disrupt an EDL rally in Birmingham. Saffiyah noticed that another woman who was protesting had been surrounded

by EDL members and was receiving racist abuse. In an act of solidarity, Saffiyah stood with the woman and challenged the hate with humour.

The Courage to Act: Mohammed Mahmoud

In June 2017, a far right terrorist attacked worshippers at Finsbury Park Mosque. Despite having just been victim to the hateful attack, Imam Mohammed Mahmoud (Centre) protected the attacker and calmed the distressed crowd until the police arrived.

Remembering Srebrenica 87

Our Impact The Stories Behind the Statistics Here we explore, how our work to Remember, Learn and Pledge impact communities in the UK. 1

OUR IMPACT

2017 in Review A Message from the Director “2017 was Remembering Srebrenica’s most impactful year to date. Our powerful theme, “Breaking the Silence: Gender and Genocide” was a catalyst for engaging new audiences and building productive partnerships. Our Regional & Country boards and Community Champions really went above and beyond, holding a record 1,000 memorial events in July alone.

Our focus on monitoring all memorial activities for 2017 also shows that the work does not begin and end with memorial week—our Champions are living the lessons from Srebrenica throughout the year.”

AMY DRAKE DIRECTOR OF REMEMBERING SREBRENICA

Memorial Week 2017: National Events Remembering Srebrenica is the sole organiser of the UK’s Srebrenica Memorial Day commemorations. National events were held in the UK and also Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The UK National Commemoration for Srebrenica brought 750 dignitaries together to hear powerful and moving stories of courage and survival from Bakira Hasečić and Munira Subašić.

First Minister with Pimlico Academy schoolchildren.

First Minister for Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon MSP addressed those present, and said:

UK National Memorial Event, Guildhall.

“The work of people like Bakira Hasečić is helping to ensure that the victims of sexual violence are heard, and that the crimes against them are not forgotten. And she is providing a further spur for all of us— Governments and communities around the world—to act to reduce and ultimately eradicate violence against women.”

Memorial Week 2017: Local Events In Memorial Week 2017 Remembering Srebrenica Community Champions and supporters achieved:

1,000+ local memorial events organised

90 Remembering Srebrenica

70,000 people brought together through memorial events in local communities

90%

of event organisers felt that memorial events offer the opportunity to bring people from different communities together and build relationships and understanding.

OUR IMPACT

Memorial Activities 2017 This year, for the first time, Remembering Srebrenica also recorded all memorial activities taking place throughout the year.

Schools Museums Arts Spaces

Workplaces

2000

Police Forces

Civic Centres

memorial activities in...

Churches

Libraries

Mosques Prisons Synagogues

Raising Awareness

Remembering Srebrenica’s awareness raising campaigns aim to:

Keep the memory of Srebrenica alive

Amplify the voices of victims and survivors

Tackle hatred & intolerance through education

In 2017, we created:

62 million opportunities to view our key messages

Our short video featuring survivor testimony was shared

500k+

Survivor stories featured in national and international media

10.3k Twitter 9.4k Facebook

times on Facebook alone Remembering Srebrenica 91

OUR IMPACT

Education Report 2017 LESSONS FROM SREBRENICA VISITS PROGRAMME

100%

of participants felt more aware of the relevance of the genocide to the UK today

200

UK citizens participated in “Lessons from Srebrenica” programme in 2017

97.6%

of participants felt they were part of an ongoing effort to create a more cohesive society

KEY DELEGATIONS • Prominent educators, including the General Secretary and President of the National Education Union • Interfaith delegations—London rabbis and imams

Gail Ross MSP in Potočari. Photo credit: John Young.

• Key political figures, including Ruth Davidson MSP and Kezia Dugdale MSP

EDUCATING YOUNG PEOPLE “The genocide in Srebrenica should never be forgotten. It teaches us a painful lesson about where hatred can lead. But as Remembering Srebrenica reminds us—it is also time to act. Schools should be places which promote respect, understanding and the value of peace. I strongly urge all

schools to educate and commemorate.

Children are our future and the prize of peace rests with them.”

KEVIN COURTNEY JOINT GENERAL SECRETARY OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATION UNION

2017 HIGHLIGHTS • 20,000 students marked Srebrenica Memorial Week—our highest number ever • 1,000 young people participated in the 8-3-7-2 football tournament, in partnership with the F.A. and Kick it Out • 2,500 young people heard direct survivor testimony through Survivors’ Lecture Tour • Key partnership with the National Education Union, extending the reach of our resources to 450,000 educators 92 Remembering RememberingSrebrenica Srebrenica

Hasan Hasanović with pupils from Hampton School.

OUR IMPACT

CASE STUDY

Future Leaders in Schools

In February 2017, 12 students from 4 different schools travelled to Bosnia-Herzegovina. On their return, they led education and commemoration in their schools to mark the 22nd anniversary of the genocide, educating 1000s of students about the lessons they learnt in Srebrenica.

12

Future Leaders in Schools “I quickly realised that to learn and understand the genocide, one does not need to memorise dates and names—it's about compassion, understanding, empathy and a drive for change in society.”

ASHLEIGH MASSINGHAM Remembering Srebrenica Future Leader

30 events

“We have to educate people about why hatred is so destructive and why tolerance is so important; without tolerance things like this can happen. We have seen the most destructive part of humanity” DRU BLACKMAN Remembering Srebrenica Future Leader

3,600 young people educated about Srebrenica by Future Leaders

“It is so important for young people to see this for themselves, to walk in the path of recent war and genocide. This is absolutely something that they need to learn and spread to other people” PAUL SALVER Teacher

Remembering Srebrenica 93

How does our work impact Board Chairs

CHAMPIONS

3 Country Boards and 6 English Regional Boards created, co-ordinated by 11 Board Chairs.

We are extremely proud that Her Majesty the Queen honoured three of our Board Chairs over the last 12 months for their work championing the message of Remembering Srebrenica.

Investing in People

CHANGE

COMMUNITIES

1,100 UK citizens have visited Bosnia-Herzegovina on our ‘Lessons from Srebrenica’ programme.

David Melding CBE Co-Chair of Remembering Srebrenica Wales

Elinor Chohan MBE Chair of Remembering Srebrenica North West

Many of our champions describe the moment of bearing witness to survivor testimony in the place that the genocide both began and ended as being a point of transformation.

Change happens when you invest in people. Through our ‘Lessons from Srebrenica’ programme, we offer a unique opportunity to engage with survivors in context—where it happened.

“It was the most difficult, yet the most inspiring experience I’ve ever had”.

Bringing Communities Together

“We engaged with different types of people which was very important...

The fact that we had in the building people who had never been to a synagogue meant that people with different ideas had the opportunity to understand we are just like you, and we are just like everyone else. We have our crosses to bear because of prejudice and preconception, but these events gave the opportunity to talk to people across the divide.”

Jim Fletcher Event Organiser

Over 5,000 memorial activities have brought more than 170,000 people together across the UK Rabbi Sybil Sheridan was so inspired by a Remembering Srebrenica memorial activity that she pledged to hold three Srebrenica memorial events at West London Synagogue in Memorial Week 2017.

94 Remembering Srebrenica

The Very Rev Dr Lorna Hood OBE Chair of Remembering Srebrenica Scotland

“I have learned to build friendships across divides such as faith and ethnicity”.

wider society?

Community Champions 1,100 Community Champions who have pledged to keep the memory of Srebrenica alive and to build a society free from hatred.

Dr Helen Connolly got involved with Remembering Srebrenica in 2015 when she led a “Lessons from Srebrenica” delegation of her students from the University of Bedfordshire.

“By actually visiting the site of the genocide, and meeting with survivors, I realised that I had now become part of the story. Once you become part of the story you cannot turn away from it.

This work has shown me how to be a better citizen, and how I can make an impact in my community through building bridges and connections. I didn’t anticipate the impact on my life the visit to Srebrenica would have on me”.

Social Action Over 75,000 young people have been educated with the lessons from Srebrenica In March 2015, Remembering Srebrenica organised its first ever survivor lecture tour. Hasan Hasanović visited Hampton School and spoke to pupils there about surviving the Death March.

Pupils from the school have set up a genocide education group,

Partnerships for Change: Tackling Hate Crime with Greater Manchester Police

After attending a “Lessons from Srebrenica” delegation in 2016, Chief Constable Ian Hopkins of Greater Manchester Police said:

Rabbi Sybil Sheridan receives Community Champion Award.

OUR IMPACT

“I will use the lessons from Srebrenica to have conversations with communities, with people I work with about how we tackle hate crime more effectively and how we overcome some of the ignorance that exist that leads to hate”

Powerful Women's Circle event with survivor Munira Subašić.

Genocide 80Twenty, which is working to transform genocide education in the UK. The dedicated group of pupils has: • conducted and presented significant research into genocide education; • written a genocide textbook, “Genocide Know More” • lobbied in Parliament for reforms to genocide education • worked with 10 schools to commemorate Srebrenica in July 2017.

He has honoured that pledge.

The partnership between GMP and Remembering Srebrenica has: • Educated over 100 police officers and cadets about Srebrenica; • Organised a hate crime conference bringing together national hate crime policing leads to hear direct survivor testimony; and • Set up an innovative mentoring programme to empower young people to find new ways to tackle hatred.

Remembering Srebrenica 95

OUR IMPACT

Remembering Srebrenica’s Work Our vision is a society free from hatred.

We work to achieve this goal by: Bringing communities together to REMEMBER Srebrenica through organising commemoration events in the UK.

5

KEY STATISTICS

Taking people on our ‘Lessons from Srebrenica’ educational visits programme to LEARN lessons from the survivors of the genocide.

What We Have Achieved in Our First 5 Years

Creating Community Champions who PLEDGE to stand up to hatred and intolerance in their communities.

1,100

Community Champions created who pledge to stand up to hate.

75,000 175,000 Educated more than

young people in the lessons from Srebrenica.

people brought together through memorial activities.

173m

5,300

Raised awareness by creating

opportunities to engage with survivor stories.

“I am incredibly proud of what Remembering Srebrenica has achieved over the last five years. For me there is no greater privilege than to honour the memories of those who were murdered, and to learn the lessons from Srebrenica to help build safer, stronger communities here in the UK. None of this would happen without the dedication and

96 Remembering RememberingSrebrenica Srebrenica

Organised over

memorial activities.

commitment of our 6 Regional and 3 Country Boards, our 1,100 Community Champions and of course the team at Remembering Srebrenica. Thank you all. Together we can achieve a society free from hatred.”

DR WAQAR AZMI OBE CHAIRMAN, REMEMBERING SREBRENICA

OUR IMPACT

HOW YOU CAN HELP

Fundraising Be a part of the change. Donate to create the world’s first International Srebrenica Memorial Learning Centre.

Help us to expand our reach by being a part of the world’s first International Srebrenica Memorial Learning Centre. The proposed Learning Centre will be the first dedicated space outside of

Bosnia-Herzegovina for sharing the lessons from this tragic episode in recent European history, and for sharing best practice in building more resilient and cohesive communities.

The proposed Learning Centre will:

Attract

25,000

visitors per annum who will learn about the genocide

Create

10,000

Photo credit: Rooful Ali

global community champions each year

Reach around

50 million people each year through media activities

To Donate

What your donation will do

You can donate directly in the following ways:

• Honour the forgotten genocide victims and their families

Online via Justgiving: https://www.justgiving.com/ummah-help Via cheque—payable to: “Remembering Srebrenica” Call our fundraising team on 0121 434 3343

• Form a living legacy for future generations to remember and learn the lessons from Srebrenica • Contribute to a more compassionate and cohesive world

You can also donate £10 NOW by texting SREB11 to 70070 Remembering Srebrenica 97

I pledge to REMEMBER and honour the victims and survivors of the Srebrenica genocide.

LEARN the lessons from Srebrenica, particularly that we must always be vigilant against hatred and intolerance in our communities.

TAKE ACTION now to build better, safer and more cohesive communities for all.

I will —tick your chosen action(s):  Work with my local community to commemorate Srebrenica Memorial Day every year on 11 July.  Educate young people about the Srebrenica genocide and the possible consequences of hatred through holding an assembly or workshop in schools or other educational establishments.  Take action personally to live the lessons, reflect on my behaviour and encourage others to do likewise.  Start my own community project to work with different community groups to challenge racism, hatred and intolerance.  Other (please specify)

Name Email Date

Return the pledge to Remembering Srebrenica, 2nd Floor, Newland House, 137-139 Hagley Road, Birmingham, B16 8UA E-mail to info@srebrenica.org.uk or fill in the form at www.srebrenica.org.uk

We would love to hear your ideas for community action to tackle hatred and intolerance. Please email these to us at info@srebrenica.org.uk

Special Thanks We are indebted to the incredibly dedicated people and organisations that we work with. We would like to say a particular thank you to:

Our four National and seven Regional Chairs and our 1,100 Community Champions who work tirelessly to honour the victims of Srebrenica through commemorations, educate future generations about the consequences of hatred, and build stronger, better communities for us all.

The Very Rev Dr Lorna Hood OBE Chair of Scotland

David Melding AM CBE Co-Chair of Wales

Saleem Kidwai OBE Co-Chair of Wales

Peter Osborne Chair of Northern Ireland

Mashuda Shaikh Chair of Yorkshire & North East

Elinor Chohan MBE Chair of North West

Alma Aganović Chair of West Midlands

Dr Helen Connolly Chair of East Midlands

Rameez Kaleem Chair of London & South East

With thanks to the support of

Anousheh Haghdadi Co-Chair of South West

Dr Louise Livesey Co-Chair of South West

“I saw how low you could go as a human being, but I also saw unbelievable acts of courage.”

HAJRUDIN MESIĆ Genocide survivor Photo credit: Rooful Ali

www.srebrenica.org.uk