Zaman, Turkey
July 11 2005
‘People Focus on Armenian Issue, Ignore Srebrenica Massacre’
By Foreign News Desk
Published: Monday July 11, 2005
zaman.com
The commemoration ceremonies for the 10th anniversary of the
Srebrenica massacre open the wounds of people who witnessed the
bloodbath. In the Srebrenica carnage, 8,000 Muslim Bosnians were
massacred towards the end of Bosnian War in Srebrenica, under the
United Nations (UN) protection.
A cover page article titled “Witnesses Tell about Srebrenica Genocide
on Its 10th Anniversary” published in the Aksiyon weekly news
magazine relates accounts by those who witnessed the butchery. The
massacre, which took place before the eyes of Dutch soldiers who were
commissioned in the UN Peace Force, is told related by eyewitnesses
as follows:
Bosnia Herzegovina Losses Commission President Amur Marsovic: 27.734
citizens were lost during the war. Ninety-two percent of them were
Bosnians, 6 percent Bosnian Serbs and 1.7 percent Bosnian Croatians.
A Macedonian Turkish citizen, Saban Huseyinov was also among the
victims. Thirteen percent of the fatalities are women. Ninety percent
of the victims were civilians. The data shows that it was a planned
annihilation. We discovered 366 mass graves.
‘Bones belonging to one person can be found in three different mass
graves’
All the graves are in the Serbian region. We have found the corpses
of 20 thousand citizens so far by deduction. I say ‘by deduction’,
because a corpse belonging to a single person was pieced together
from three different graves in a 30-kilometer radius of each other.
In addition, we encountered corpses, which had changed places few
times. We found bones cut to pieces by heavy construction equipment.
Even the Nazis were not so brutal. The Western world wants to ignore
the massacre and not accept responsibility for it. This is what hurts
us most. If we must live together again, they should accept this.
They pressure Turkey to accept the Armenian genocide but the
parliamentarians themselves to not discuss this. Political decisions
are taken, but Srebrenica massacre occurred ten years ago and all of
its witnesses are here. They want to burry Srebrenica into history
and cover it up.
Srebrenica Massacre architect remains in office
Hasan Nuhanovich translates for the Dutch soldiers, “The Serbs
occupied the villages near the city and bombarded them. Despite the
occurrence of these incidents, United Nations (UN) commanders said,
“Do not worry, you are under our protection until a political
solution is found. If the Serbs attack, we will bomb them by planes.”
The Serbs attacked the city from four different directions on July 6.
The Dutch troops did not shoot even a single bullet. They collected
the Bosnians together who wanted to defense themselves and seized
their weapons already less in number. The biggest massacre occurred
from 11-12 July 1995. Serb soldiers occupying the city separated the
men from the women. They killed some of the men at point blank and
took others to the forest. The Dutch soldiers watched the incidents
and some of them even helped the Serbs. They took about 5,000
Bosnians including my brother out of the concentration camp on July
13 and killed men in full view of the others. I lost both my father
and mother at the same time. The biggest injustice the Dutch soldiers
did to the Bosnians was keeping the developments secret. The world
did not learn about what was going on here for a long time. Mane
Curic, the Srebrenica police chief chose people to be killed in front
of the UN troops. He is still the security chief in Srebrenica.
Neither the European Union (EU) nor the US has done anything on the
issue. Despite knowing Mladic’s whereabouts, US soldiers have not
apprehended him.
Nura Alispahic: When I turned on the television to watch the news
last month, I saw my little son for whom I have cried for during the
past 10 years. These were the first images of the Srebrenica massacre
broadcast by The Hague. My son had lost a lot of weight. The Serbs
took them out of a car. Then, they executed four of them by shooting
them. I saw my son later. When they killed the person next to him, my
son returned to view. He looked as if he was asking for help. I
rushed to the television from where I sat and fainted at the second
step. They shot my son. I saw him for the last time when the Serbs
entered the city. Thousands of Bosnians like us had taken shelter in
a factory where the Dutch soldiers had camped. The soldiers handed us
over to the Serbs. My son was looking for an escape exit from the
forest to flee the impending execution. I cannot forget the moment I
embraced him for the last time.
Nura Alispahic’s daughter Makbule: The Serbs planned everything in
advance. The UN soldiers silences us. While we were awaiting death,
they were amusing each other. Even the drivers of the buses bringing
us to Tuzla were Serbs. When the Chetniks stopped the buses on the
road, the drivers opened the doors and said to them, “Take whichever
one you like!”
Vice President of Srebrenica Mothers Foundation Kada Hotic: “I lost
my husband, children and many of my relatives on July 11. The bones
of my husband and his relatives were found in a mass grave recently;
but still there is no news of my children. I do not think that there
will be fair trials at the War Crimes Trial in Lahey. Will the
Western World, which condoned the war crimes during the war, find the
criminals and judge them? No! Everything we experienced is so
transparent; but we cannot find any addressee to apply. No Western
foundation wants to accept the events we experienced, as genocide.
1042 children are still lost. 570 girls were violated and killed.
They executed men by shooting them in front of my eyes. They killed a
little child, who was crying out of fear of being executed by
snatching him from his mother’s arms. There are thousands of
eyewitnesses to these events; but no one listens to them.
Elvisa Lokman: When the war started, my childhood ended.
My father was never with me when I needed him most. I will never
forget how the Serbs decapitated Akif and played football with his
head. I thought my childhood would be returned to me after Srebrenica
was made secure. I will never forgive myself for not embracing and
kissing my father. I did not want to believe that it would be the
last time I saw him. But, I never saw him again. Today, I am still
afraid of the dark. I jump out of bed screaming at the slightest
sound in the house.
Our Serbian neighbor was shouting: Kill for me too
>From the Srebrenica memoir of Sevliya Feyzic: Early in the morning,
we all went to the factory where the UN troops were camped. We were
15,000 people in and around the factory. The UN soldiers did nothing.
The Serbs raped young girls. Some men were shot before the factory.
On July 12, in the morning, trucks and buses arrived. Among the Serb
soldiers, I saw two of my neighbors, Zlatan and Cvetin. They were
shouting as they kicked us. The bus driven by the Serbs headed
towards Bratunats. On the road, there were Chetniks who stopped the
buses, chose some men and shot them. Our neighbor Milan Micic driving
the car opened the door and shouted, “Kill for me too”. The Serbs got
down and raped young girls among who was my aunt’s daughter.
The Bosnian Major of Srebrenica: Before the war, the population of
Srebrenica was 36,000, of which 20,000 was Bosnian, 8,000 Serb, and
the remaining part consisted of Croats and other ethnic groups. Only
3,000 Bosnians could return to the city. There are currently 10,000
people living in the city 6,000 of whom are Serb.