July the 11th 1995, as bosniak muslim families full of children, fathers and mothers sat in the UN safe areas of Srebrenica. Serbian 'army' led by Ratko Mladic and others managed to get into the united nations protected zone and handed out sweets, chocolate and promises of safety from the shelling and brutal killing that was going on elsewhere in the Balkan country. Women and children were innocent, unaware that they were being separated from their male partners and young sons and brothers, only to never see them again.
On this day of 11/7/95, Serb forces rounded up all muslim men and boys, lined them up one by one and shot them, cold bloodedly...simply for being Muslim. Although women bosniaks were spared this death, many were treated with the same intentions..being brutally raped, abused and in some cases they were killed as well. One horrific very graphic story tells of a woman whose child 'her beautiful rose' was crying in the bus that was transporting the bosnian women and their children to supposed safety. A Serb man came over to the apparent aid of this woman in clear distress and took the child from her, promising that he would feed her (as this was why the child was was crying in the first place). Long lengthly moments passed for the young woman until the man returned. She was eternally grateful, this man (Serbian man) had appeared to show empathy towards her and her child when others of the same nationality were killing her people. The soldier handed back the child to her mother claiming that now she 'would never cry', the mother felt the bundle on her lap, it was heavy..lifeless..blood covered her hands, the 'child was full of blood', he had killed her not fed her.
Thousands upon thousands of muslims were killed on this grim day, many of whose bodies are still being discovered today. Every year on this exact date 11/7, newly discovered and identified remains of the victims of the genocide are laid to finally rest. A mass funeral is held every year for these people and many turn out to show their respect, today some 30,000 muslims alone went to bury their dead of which there was 520 newly discovered remains. You may be thinking: why are they still finding these remains today?. Well the truth is that the perpetrators dug mass graves for their victims so that their crimes would not be discovered and their tracks would remain covered as would the extent of their crimes. However their desires were not appeased and indeed each year the true horror of what happened in those few days faces us again. So far over the 17 years 5,325 people have been found in this way (from mass graves) and laid to rest.
Although many Serbians deny this genocide and the fact that it ever happened, the terrible crimes have not been forgotten to this day, our prime minister today said that this GENOCIDE, should not be 'denied or forgotten' and he is indeed right as is Barack Obama who honoured the 8,000 victims of the attack. At the mass funeral earlier today, a guest speaker (a rabbi) had these few meaningful words to say: He said the Srebrenica genocide was a crime against humanity but also a crime allowed by the rest of humanity. 'Silence is not a solution, it only encourages the perpetrators and ultimately it pays a heavy price in blood.
This terrible act indeed was a slaughter of innocent people for no reason other than that they were muslim. The international community allowed this to happen, could have done more. The one thing that astounds me is that i myself was not aware of this horrific incident until only 2 years ago. Surely this shows that we aren't taught about it, there is not enough awareness of what happened. Whenever i speak to people i know about the srebrenica disaster or the Bosnia war in general, people do not seem to have much of an opinion. Either that or they don't know about it at all and therefore find it hard to imagine the scale of what happened and the fact that the victims were indeed MUSLIMS! This fact people find it hard to imagine, what with the negative aspects of certain groups being projected more than the positives, its hard for some to imagine that muslims here were the victims and it is because of their beliefs that they were the victims. Another major factor that people are not aware as much of is the fact that Bosnia is infact a predominantly Muslim country in the EUROPE! Therefore when people talk about the islamisation of europe, they forget that they have muslims in the shape of blonde hair/blue eyed Bosnians in EUROPE. Also Kosovo/Albania/Chechenya etc.
I wish that this horrible genocide was made more public and taught in schools for everyone to know about, no oen should forget these acts and the victims of these acts. For example not one tv station yesterday i saw had any coverage of the mass funeral or the fact that new bodies had been identified.
We must never forget what happened and we must never stay silent about the atrocities. Maybe in another 17 years time we will look back on this day and remember be remembering the horrible acts that are happening right now in syria..lets hope not, but its a valid possibility. Also for those that deny: there is no point in denying that this was a genocide, its clear to see that it was and there was no 2 equal sides in this war as Angelina Jolie said whilst filming her film 'in the land of blood and honey'. 'the war wasn't like that'.
For now never forget Srebrenica, pray for the victims and pray that this sort of monstrous act never ever happens again.
