Youth Struggle Against Hate and Division in Post-War Bosnia and Herzegovina

— angelikí maría mitsaki

For more than one thousand years the geographical region of Bosnia-Herzegovina has been inhabited by diferent ethnicities with diferent religions and dogmas. The main historical source of this region which refers to the religious and ethnic diversity goes back to the beginning of the 9th century. At that time the people from the western parts of the region, such as various areas of the modern state of Croatia, Dalmatia and parts of Montenegro, declared themselves as Catholic Christians. Meanwhile the people from the eastern parts, such as western modern Serbia, Republika Srbska and various parts of Montenegro, declared themselves members of the Bosnian Christian Church, which around the middle of 10th century acceded to the auspices of the Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarchy of Constantinople. Besides the rapid expansion of the Otoman Empire all around the Balkan Peninsula during the 15th century, the partial Islamization of the conquered population also started, sometimes as the only choice for survival and sometimes by the free will of the persons. So, in the middle of the 16th century the first Muslim groups of inhabitants started to appear in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The centuries lapsed, and empires rose and fell. Bosnia-Herzegovina was part of the Byzantine, Otoman and the Austro-Hungarian empire, partially belonged to the first Kingdom of Serbia and Montenegro, a member of the second Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians, and a crucial geographical territory of the first and the second Yugoslavia (literally “Land of Southern Slavs”). Each form of authority treated each ethnic and religious group beter or worse depending on the common characteristic they shared or their usefulness to the ruling powers. For example, during the Byzantine times or the times of the Kingdom of Serbia and Montenegro, the Orthodox population was in a more beneficial position than the Catholic or the Muslim population. On the other hand, during the Otoman empire the Muslims were considered high class citizens, while the Catholics lived beter under the Austro-Hungarian government. It is a commonly accepted fact that all religions, dogmas and ethnicities were almost equally accepted during the first Yugoslavia, while on the times of the second socialist Yugoslavia no religion, dogma or ethnicity was tolerated in any way. More specifically, the political confrontation of religion during Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (sfry) changed more or less each decade. From the complete prohibition of any kind of religious public practice, participation and expression during the late 1940s and 1950s, Tito and the governors of the socialist republic gradually started to permit expression of religiosity. However, these expressions unfortunately were almost immediately linked with the nationalistic and political agendas of the political parties of each ethnic group. After the death of Tito in 1980 the situation started to get out of hand and within twelve years the simmering nationalism, which was always related with religion, finally exploded.

In the beginning of the 1990s one of the most abominable wars in modern European history took place in the Balkans.

The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia had fallen, and the modern states of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, Kosovo and North Macedonia took its place, some of them through war some of them peacefully. Bosnia-Herzegovina’s land was located exactly in the middle of the sfry’s territory and later was it in the middle of the belligerent area. As a consequence, most of its population was ethnically and religiously mixed (13% of mixed marriages was the average number all over ex-Yugoslavia meanwhile specifically in Bosnia Herzegovina this percentage was nearly 40%, that’s why almost the overwhelming majority of the villages and cities had mixed inhabitants). But because the war was generally characterized by the components of religion and ethnicity (components which have already been mentioned that existed for centuries in this part of the world), the fanaticism of nationalism and the hate of every group against the others, the most cruel and heinous war crimes took place in the most mixed and crucially located region: Bosnia-Herzegovina.

For someone who is not familiar with the topic a general delineation of the groups and their ethnoreligious identification is the following: A Catholic believer must be Croat, an Orthodox one a Serb, and a Muslim has to be Bosniak. As it is mentioned above, during Tito’s time the entire population of ex-Yugoslavia was mixed and there was no “pure” ethnic or religious community within the region. However, when the political situation within the Republic started to change and the ethnic parties gradually became nationalistic, this identification meant that as the war started families began to fight against each other, neighbors and friends were killing one another and the conflicts quickly burst out all around the territory. The clashes were terrible and thousands of innocent civilians died. Many of them tried to escape as refugees both within and outside the borders of ex-Yugoslavia, but unfortunately not all of them succeeded to find a safe place to stay. The years passed, and neither side seemed willing to give up but neither could triumph as well. Thus, when the United Nations finally imposed a short-term period of peace in the region of Bosnia-Herzegovina by forcing all three sides (Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims) to sign the famous Dayton Agreement and bring back tranquility to the long-sufering state of the Balkans, no one expected that this short-term agreement would last until today. Additionally, even though the agreement was favorably signed and the batles ofcially ended, it had and still has a long way to go until peace is permanently established in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Afer the signing of the Dayton Agreement the armed conflicts stopped, but that did not mean that the war stopped. It just changed form and way of action. An informal kind of religious and ethnic cleansing started to take place and it continues into the present day. Bosnian citizens move into cities, towns or villages depending primarily on which group lives there and which are its religious beliefs. So, even if the population is still mixed, Banja Luka, the capital of the mini state of Republika Srbska, which constitutes 49% of the whole country, is inhabited by ethnically Serbian Bosnians who believe in the Orthodox dogma. Meanwhile other cities like Goražde or Čapljina are inhabited mostly by Muslim Bosniaks or Catholic Bosnian-Croats, respectively. The hate and the discrimination among the ethnicities is very strong and very obvious across all regions of the country.

One would expect that the people who experienced the war and all the brutalities it brought would be significantly narrow-minded and ultra-nationalists, but the opposite reality comes as a surprise. Paradoxically, the children who were born afer the war ended in 1995 are more nationalistic than the generation of their parents who lived through all of the atrocities. This is because the generations who grew up afer the war, although not traumatized by the shocking experiences and memories, live in homogeneous and coreligionist communities where they, nonetheless, feel the old pull of their families and their ancestors.

Unfortunately, a clear example of this kind of division into three diferent religions and ethnicities is the separated schools. The educational system reflects the general political and social reality, which means in general terms that each ethnic or religious group teaches its own perspective of historical facts, especially about what happened from 1990 and onward. Each side is taught that they were the victims and the others were the aggressors and neither one of them learn about the atrocities and the crimes their own side commited. It is easy to understand that people who are nurtured by these values and this education see the religious and ethnic Other in a particular way. The mixed marriages between Orthodox, Catholics and Muslims are now only 4% of all marriages, while since the ofcial end of the war there are people who do not even want to walk in the same area as the religious or ethnic Other. The example of Mostar’s bridge is very characteristic. Mostar used to be a city where mostly Catholic Bosnian-Croats and Muslim Bosniaks lived. During the war they tried to exterminate one another with indescribable hate and fury. When the war ended and slowly life started to flow again, the city also started to reveal its new form. The once mixed and peaceful city had been divided into two parts with the Catholic Bosnian-Croats on one side of the bridge and the Muslim Bosniaks on the other. This division makes the city look like there are two litle independent towns. Mostar nowadays has two bus stations, two train stations, strictly divided restaurants, cafeterias and an inane competition of which religious temple – cathedral or mosque – is going to be taller than the other. In the city of Mostar there are people who do not even cross the bridge anymore and do not visit the other side of their city. But the division among the bars and the cafeterias is obvious everywhere within the country. In Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina and Republika Srbska, where the three groups live separately but still together, it is easy for a visitor to see that there is one bar for each religion/ethnicity from the tents and the brands they use. For instance, Sarajevsko beer is for the Muslim Bosniaks (the average Muslim in Bosnia-Herzegovina drinks alcohol, smokes and behaves like the rest of his or her non-Muslim compatriots), Ožujsko beer is for the Catholic Bosnian-Croats and Jelen beer is for the Orthodox Bosnian-Serbs. This is a widespread picture all around the country.

Apart from the factors that divide the people, there are also a few that unite them. The most important one is the strong phenomenon of unemployment. Even though the Dayton Agreement had delivered respite from war in most recent years, it has not established a harmonious and free well-being sense of peace. Any kind of development which can create working places requires a stable, and in one way or another, trustworthy political situation within the country, a fact that does not exist in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The political instability and the extreme corruption lead to a very high percentage of unemployment within the whole territory (39%) and especially among the youths (60%). Consequently, waves of mostly young Bosnians of all the ethnoreligious groups emigrate abroad in order to find a beter future in safer and more stable countries. The high number of talented young Bosnians who leave their country has created various problems, but one of the most important among them is that they are not there anymore to play their own crucial role in the reconstruction and change of the political scene and the improvement of the state of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

In this environment of hate, thankfully there are still some young people who have decided to fight against the bigotry and the intransigence which characterize the modern society of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Through few non-government organizations and with the contribution of some university projects, young people from diferent ethnic and religious backgrounds come together and try to solve the uncountable problems their post-war society faces. Their main goal is to fight against the ignorance and the stereotypes that exist by geting to know each other and by trying to break the created taboos which make the unsound educational system due to the strong support of the media and the many corrupted ideas they serve. The territorial isolation of the three diferent groups and the continued reproduction of animosity and antagonism among them make the acquital of the Other really difcult. In recent years some university faculties have started to run various interreligious parallel studies in which students from Orthodox, Catholic and Islamic studies have the chance to cooperate, study and get to know the religious culture of the others – an action which has never been accomplished before – in a safe and respectful academic environment. Faculties from Serbia and Croatia participate in these parallel studies, which play their own additional and important role in the peace-building atempt within Bosnia-Herzegovina. ngos contribute as well by organizing summer camps where an equal percentage of the three involved ethnoreligious groups participate. These summer camps are run basically for children and adolescents and usually the team leaders are also young people from diferent ethnoreligious backgrounds. Through various games and activities they bring the upcoming generation of Bosnian citizens closer and they try to reverse the general negative feeling by building friendships and creating happy and carefree memories. During the year they also have occasional events so that they can contact new people and let anyone who is interested get to know each other. But unfortunately, quite ofen, even if the kids want to make a diference and overcome the widespread hatred mentality, the parents block them and use them as social and political vehicles which must carry the beliefs and the ideas of the family. If more atention is paid to the direction of love and friendship in a wider context, then we can speak again about hope, peace and quality of life in the long-sufering country of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Last but not least the Jewish minority plays its own significant role in the Bosnian-Herzegovinian reality. Jews have a long history in the territory of modern Bosnia-Herzego- vina and they ofer a lot of important values in the creation and the configuration of its society today. Sadly, the once great Jewish community of the country did not escape the extermination of the Holocaust in the passage of the Second World War and as a result the current Jewish community is dramatically reduced. Due to the already almost impossible to deal with political mess in the country where all the administrations and public sectors are divided into three – one for each ethnic and religious group – there is no space for the Jewish people, who do not even have the basic political rights of an average Bosnian citizen (Jews, Roma and others who do not identify as one of the three constituent peoples according to the Dayton Agreement in 1995 are treated as second-class citizens and, for example, do not have the right to elect or be elected). According to Sergio Della Pergola, a demographer of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, there are about 500-1000 Jewish people living in Bosnia-Herzegovina, but unofcially this number is almost double because many of them choose to hide their real religious identity so that they can enjoy basic civil rights. The hopeful news is that there are active young Jews who try to raise their voice and demonstrate their existence within this unfair political situation and some of them participate in the inter-religious university studies and programs in the peace-building ngos.