Thousands remember 'one of humanity's greatest shames'
Thousands of survivors of Europe’s worst massacre of civilians since the Second World War marked the eighth anniversary of the slaughter today by burying 282 more identified bodies.
Shortly before the end of Bosnia’s 1992-95 war, up to 8,000 Muslims, mostly men and boys, were slaughtered at Srebrenica by Bosnian Serb soldiers who overran the eastern town, then a UN protected zone.
The victims’ bodies were dumped in mass graves throughout eastern Bosnia. Forensics experts so far have exhumed more than 5,000 bodies, 1,620 of which have been identified through DNA analysis and other techniques.
On Friday, eight years after the slaughter began on July 11, 1995, 282 identified bodies were laid to rest at a new Srebrenica cemetery dedicated to the victims. The first 600 identified remains were buried there earlier this year.
After noon prayers, Mustafa Ceric, head of the Islamic community in Bosnia, told the crowd of 20,000 survivors, guests, foreign ambassadors and local politicians that the Srebrenica massacre would go down in history as one of ”humanity’s greatest shames”.
“The two top fugitives are still laughing in the face of the world, while at the same time the mothers of Srebrenica are still screaming for their sons,” Ceric said.
Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic and his military commander, Ratko Mladic – both indicted in 1995 by the UN tribunal in The Hague for genocide and crimes against humanity at Srebrenica and elsewhere – are still at large.
In the afternoon sun, family members gathered around the caskets lined up in long rows and draped with green cloth as thousands watched, many of them weeping openly.
Women usually are not allowed to attend Muslim burials, but Srebrenica is an exception. Male family members carefully lowered the caskets into the ground, while women cried as they placed flowers on the graves. Young Muslim women read aloud the names of those being buried.
Among the survivors who returned for today’s ceremony was Ajka Hasanovic, burying seven members of her family, including her three sons.
Her husband’s remains still have not been found.
“Why live when you lost everything you were living for?” Hasanovic, 60, asked tearfully. “I won’t find peace until I lay down next to them.”
Of the 282 victims being buried Friday, 26 were under the age of 18 and the two oldest were 75.
Families like the Hasanovics were virtually wiped out by Serb soldiers who separated the men and boys from the women and girls, hauled them away, forced them to strip and shot them one by one.
Besides the seven victims bearing the name Hasanovic, mourners buried nine members of the Salihovic family, nine members of the Alic family and six members of the Omerovic family.
Tahira Osmanovic, 45, and her 11-year-old daughter, Sahza, arrived from Colorado, where they started a new life in 1996. Osmanovic lost her husband, Ibrahim, and their 16-year-old son, Edin.
“I lost consciousness when they separated me from my husband and son, and when I woke up, they were gone,” she said. “I never saw them again.”
Amer Halilovic, 13, was in Srebrenica to bury his father, Hajro.
“I don’t remember my father. I just remember when some people with weapons separated me and mom from my brother and father. All I remember is Mama crying and I was scared,” recalled Halilovic, who was five when the massacre took place.
His mother couldn’t muster the strength to come to the ceremony, he said.
The ceremony was guarded by hundreds of Serb police officers who kept a low profile, seen only at a distance from the cemetery and roads to Srebrenica.
Bosnian Serb Prime Minister Dragan Mikerevic also attended the ceremony, the first high-ranking Serb official ever to attend a Srebrenica anniversary.
“The time has come to talk about everything that happened in this area,” Mikerevic said.
About 250,000 people were killed in the war between Bosnian Muslims, Croats and Serbs. Since the end of the conflict, about 16,500 bodies have been exhumed from more than 300 mass graves throughout the country.
