As a 9-year-old girl, I remember vividly during one of my summer vacations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, sitting in front of the television whose language was still unintelligible to me, and watching scenes whose substance needed no explanation.  The clips contained images of old women hunched over headstones, shedding tears into clasped hands whilst coffins were passed overhead between the fingertips of many raised hands.  Old footage of men being lined up and shot without any hesitation were shown, followed by hundreds upon hundreds of people walking past a mountain range with a few belongings, moving towards no clear end. I watched on whilst my whole world seemed to stop, these scenes and its eerie music suggesting to my childlike mind that something drastic was happening, yet something unexplainable. As I saw these exact same scenes being repeated during my visits to Bosnia in the future years, I started to realise that this ‘something’ had already occurred, an event in a town unknown to my young self, called ‘Srebrenica’. 

Later I understood that the genocide of over 8,000 people in Srebrenica was just one more attempt by the Bosnian Serbs to fully eradicate the Bosnian Muslims of their existence.  I now ask, 26 years later, whether anyone remembers the Muslims residing in Srebrenica outside the yearly gatherings on the 11th of July? Every year we remember Srebrenica for those who were unjustly killed, but do we remember the victims who are still alive? When everyone leaves the graveyard at Potočari after the ceremony concludes, does anyone give a second thought to those who live only a short walk away from the vicinity of the graveyards? On that day the graveyards are surrounded by those who come to show their support and sympathy, but when the crowds disperse, and a new day arrives, the victims still find themselves living among the perpetrators who commemorate that day of grief as one of liberation, or worse, they deny the event altogether. 

It is also a recognition from the Bosnian Serbs that the victims need most for their lives to regain some normalcy after their losses.  Without this recognition from those whom they live among, it is difficult for them to find closure. In the face of such denial, they have been forced to redirect their energy into the pursuit of justice for their loved ones who were killed. They have been robbed of the space to truly overcome their grief because they must prove the crimes occurred and the legitimacy of their feelings to the perpetrators which ultimately only prolongs them.  Each year the identity of the bones of more corpses are established and they are finally buried, whilst the grieving continues for family and community.  What support is being provided to the living, for whom the event is still very much alive? How can there be reconciliation without an acceptance of the truth about the perpetrators? 

The continuation of the hateful rhetoric of genocide denial has made this possible by becoming systemic within the Republic of Serbia (Repúblika Srpska), including Srebrenica where its mayor, local politicians, and institutional bodies all reject what happened on the 11th of July 1995. This reality is simply inescapable for the Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica, where discrimination has been an aftermath for all ordinary Muslims living in areas that were granted control to the Serbs after the war. In Srebrenica where the unemployment rate has consistently been around 50%, Muslims find their opportunities further hindered because of their identity. Bosnian Muslims who start families in Srebrenica fear for the fate of their children because of historical revisionism that is being taught in classrooms by means of a school curriculum that is left unmonitored on the state level, leading to increased stigmatisation of Muslim youth within the area. One example of such can be found in an incident that took place in a primary school where pupils practiced the three-finger salute behind the head of a fellow classmate who happened to be Muslim, during a class photograph, representing to Bosnian Muslims what a swastika does to German Jews. For returnees, the situation is no better. One woman laments how she lived without electricity for four years upon return to their home in Srebrenica because of utility poles being destroyed by the Bosnian Serb army during the war to encourage the withdrawal of Muslims from the area. Under such circumstances, the emergence of any true reconciliation process has been lacking, and the habitual expression of the view that Bosnian Muslims don’t belong in their own birthplace persists (those being the area’s most ethnically cleansed of Muslims during the war) and only serves to deepen these long-standing wounds further. 

The Muslims of Srebrenica, its youth, and survivors have been subjugated to live amongst the killers of their family members, and often for women this means living among their rapists.  Having to endure this everyday struggle on their own terms, also echoes the reality of many survivors in towns like Foča, Višegrad, and Prijedor that saw a similar fate as in Srebrenica but on a lower scale. The number of services within the area of Srebrenica is limited. There is a shortage of therapists, hospitals, and recovery clinics, further amplified by the poor economic conditions and lack of security. For the victims of Srebrenica, their own resilience has been borne from within, and whilst the Dayton Agreement was important for bringing a halt to the war in 1995, it has proven to be an effective tool for the propagation of denialism and division at the state level. The peace deal of 1995 adopted the view that all sides in the war were equal which ignored disproportionate crimes committed against the Bosnian Muslims, making justice and the establishment of truth a secondary concern. It split the country along ethnic lines, not only geographically but politically, making all major decision-making processes dependent upon the approval of representatives from each of the three main ethnic groups, which in turn has reinforced people’s affiliations to their respective religious/ethnic group identity to an even higher degree. 

The international community, and actors in Europe in particular, need to better understand and provide support to survivors that extends beyond the surface, and beyond only commemorating the Srebrenica genocide. These appear to be more to do with their own domestic political agendas of integration/cohesion aimed at local Muslim communities, than concern for Bosnian Muslims.  

They can also do this by calling out those who deny the crimes committed in Srebrenica and by providing real opportunities for those who have been left behind to sustain themselves financially. The harsh reality is that as long as Bosnia and Herzegovina’s constitution follows that of the Dayton Agreement, victims will not be able to find peace in their hometown where the status quo insists on their inferiority, under the domination of those who sought their elimination in the first place.  It is important in light of this, that attention is given to the youth in providing them with a schooling experience that will insist on the idea of coexisting peacefully, to combat nationalist sentiments propagated within family circles and build a collective identity that taps into the notion of being ‘Bosnian’, similar to what has been exercised in the likes of Rwanda. However, without changes at the macro level, steps such as these towards sustainable peace seem ineffective, and this is where focus from the international community is needed, in bringing about a new conversation where sentiments of division are neither nurtured nor suppressed, but rather dealt with and tackled head on.

Even though it is important to commemorate the genocide in Srebrenica on the 11th of July and reflect on the lives tragically taken, it is also as important to remember those who have remained behind in these parts and who experience hatred and denial on a daily basis. It is important that we hear their voices and help create a healthy environment for them to live in. Until this happens, we have not only failed to help those who were murdered, but also those who have survived. 

A personal reflection by Hana Efendić who is of Bosnian Muslim origin. 

Hana Efendić is a Research Intern at the Ayaan Institute. She is the author of a published novel called Nia.

[1] The Dayton Accords of 1995 had the effect of rewarding the Bosnian Serbs, by providing them with a state of their own (Republika Srpska). The Bosnian Muslims were not provided with a separate state of their own but forced to accept a shared state and government with Bosnian Serbs and Croats, in which the Presidency is rotated between communities every 18 months.  This had the effect of denying the majority Muslim population of Bosnia what would have been a Muslim majority state at the heart of Europe.  Former US President Bill Clinton has said this was the aim of European policy on Bosnia at the time, and hence their lack of action to intervene on the side of Bosnian Muslims to prevent massacres. 

[2] Since this article was written a decision has been made by Bosnia and Herzegovina’s UN High Representative, Valentin Inzko to introduce a law prosecuting genocide denial. This shows that a surface level approach is no longer feasible nor desirable. However, representatives from Republika Srpska have boycotted major institutions in defiance of the new law. This again points to the crucial role of Bosnian Serbs in helping the country heal, but one they appear not willing to play.