Srebrenica massacre, Sarajevo, BiH

Today, David and Emily toured the "Gallery 11/07/95" in Sarajevo. A photography gallery showing pictures of victims of Genocide at Srebrenica on 11/07/95 (July 11th for Americans). This is a tough subject, but terribly significant to Bosnia and Herzegovina. Mostar museums also dedicated exhibits to this event and the western world shares responsibility. It feels important that we mention this event as well.

During the war in Bosnia in the early 90s, the UN did not want to get involved, but did eventually declare the eastern city of Srebrenica (right near Serbia) a safe zone. The city was quickly flooded with war refuges and dealt with water and food supply issues. Srebrenica quickly became a slum, but those inside were thankful for the opportunity to escape war. A Dutch peacekeeping force was dispatched to protect the city from attackers and used an old Factory at Potočari as their base of operation.

By July 11th, 20K to 25K refuges were in the general Potočari area. Bosnian Serb forces (aka VRS) began to surround Srebrenica and Dutch forces denied access of sufficient refugees into the Potočari compound. Eventually the Dutch forces proved insufficiently armed and were forced to evacuate. No more UN forces or air support was dispatched to the aide of Srebrenica.

Male refugees were separated from women and children. From there mass execution of males began. Bodies were buried in multiple mass graves. In some instances, to hide their war crimes, bodies were dug up and moved to secondary graves, and sometimes into even tertiary mass graves.

Today, through DNA analysis, 6,838 victims have been identified. However, the list of missing persons is currently at 8,372 and DNA analysis continues to this day. In some instances, entire families were wiped out so no DNA analysis can be used to identify bodies. The identities of those families have been lost. Many mothers and widows still believe their men may still be found as a war prisoner, but continued visits from the Bosnian Federal Commission of Missing Persons are usually not met with years of happiness.Read more