The Massacre and the Missing Bodies - Srebrenica, 10 years on

By Alex - From Belgrade

July 11, 2005

Editor's Note: Today is the 10th Anniversary of what has become known as the "Massacre" at Srebrenica, in Bosnia. It is an event that has been used to justify such things as the bombing of Kosovo and Belgrade for 79 days during 1999 by NATO. The claim has been repeated by the media and by governments that 8000 unarmed civilian men and boys were brutally murdered by Serbs. Because of that claim, the former leader of Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosevic has been on trial for 4 years at the International Criminal Court at the Hague. Yet, a simple rule of law, habeas corpus, protected by the U.S. Constitution, has been totally ignored at Srebrenica. In order to prove a murder - there MUST be a body. The bodies of the 8000 "victims" at Srebrenica and the 100,000 "victims" in Kosovo that were the "reason" for actions against the Serbs have never been found - in spite of teams of forensic experts from many countries coming to Bosnia and to Kosovo to search for them. This letter from a reader in Belgrade succinctly lays out the serious questions about this mysterious "massacre" that produced so few bodies.

The West seems generally convinced that about 8,000 Bosnian Muslim (Bosniaq) men and boys were murdered in Srebrenica by the Bosnian Serb Army and the Serbian Security Forces in 1995.

Although something awful seems to have happened in Srebrenica in 1995, we should mention just several pieces that do not fit the puzzle.

Mary Mostert, an idependent US journalist and analyst, had corresponded with Almir Radic, a Bosniaq who claims to have been a UN employee at the time. After a lengthy exchange of emails and a bunch of insults from Radic, he admitted that the Dutch UN troops had given their arms (guns) to the Bosniaqs. That would mean two things: that the UN peacekeepers had violated their mandate and that they had chosen to support one side in a conflict. Also, that would mean that those Bosniaqs were NOT unarmed, thus, in a war, being legitimate targets. You can read some of her eye-opening articles at www.bannerofliberty.com

Upon entering the town, the Bosniaq women and children were unharmed, and were later bused by the Serbs to Muslim territory. If the Serbs really wanted to perform an act of genocide, they would have murdered the women and children. Instead, they provided buses and a safe route for them to get to the Muslim-held Tuzla area.

One year on, from the initial list of "massacred" Bosniaqs, which holds upto 8,000 names, some 3,000 people had turned up to vote in the Bosnian elections. The list was first named "list of the missing Bosniaqs from Srebrenica", and was later named "list of the massacred Bosniaq civilians". One could say - those that survived came back and voted. Okay.But, why were those 3,000 names of survivors NOT removed from the list?

It is also noteworthy to mention that war in Bosnia and Hercegovina, including Srebrenica, raged from 1992 to 1995, not just in 1995. Before the Serbs had entered Srebrenica, the notorious Muslim forces led by Naser Oric had murdered most Serbs in the area of Srebrenica. In Skelani, Bratunac, Kravice. Some 300 Serb civilians had been massacred in Skelani, and on Orthodox Christmas, 70 Serb civillians were massacred by the Muslims in Kravice. In all, about 3,000 Serbian civilians from Srebrenica and the surrounding villages were massacred by the Muslims, from 1992 to 1995, BEFORE the Serbian forces took the town. Apart from Naser Oric's Bosniaq forces, also present were the mujahedins from Arab countries, such as the "El Mujahedin" unit that was notorious for its crimes and beheaded Serbs.

Although the West has seen a video of Serbs executing the Bosniaqs - the video certainly does not show the executions in their thousands, and although what happened in those videos is, of course, terrible, the world has refused to see the videos of Serbs being massacred. Are the tears of Serbian mothers less important than the tears of Muslim mothers? Are Serbian boys less important than Muslim boys? The Western media have demonized the Serbs so much, that rarely, very rarely, are the Serbian victims shown. Always the victims belong to the Bosniaq, Croat or Albanian side. Rarely, or never do the Western media show Serbian victims. And Serbs, believe it or not, are the largest victims of the war in the former Yugoslavia, the largest ethnically displaced group with the highest number of refugees, and there are videos of crimes committed against the Serbs. Those videos the Western media are continually refusing to show. Bear in mind that the Serbs, those same "monsters", were US allies in BOTH world wars, which cannot be said for the Croats, Muslims, Albanians...

So far, the 8,000 Srebrenica bodies have not been found, even though the utmost technology was put in place. There are in total 2,000 bodies found so far. Bear in mind that most of those could have died in fighting and that, yes, some could have been shot from close range. Where are the remaining 6,000 bodies? Surely the American spy satellites are able to detect any suspsicious motion on the ground (digging, moving the remains to other locations etc).

Why did the Bosniaq men not stay and fight the Serbs? They left their families - women and small children at the hands of the Serbs. Was it because they knew no harm would come to their families? What kind of a man leaves his family unprotected, to save his own skin? Did they run because they knew what crimes they had committed against the Serbs?

Why is the monument to the Srebrenica victims inscribed entirely in Arabic? Nobody in Bosnia and Hercegovina speaks and understands Arabic, except some islamic clergy. Was that a sign of gratitude to the mujahedins from Arab countries, whom are known to be connected to Al Qaeda, the same terrorist group that the US is now fighting?

The current Serbian politicians - Svetozar Marovic, Boris Tadic, Vuk Draskovic and some others have expressed regret regarding Srebrenica and have apologized for those and other crimes committed in the Serbian name. The Serbian president Boris Tadic will be attending the 10th anniversary in the Potocari memorial center in Srebrenica. But, it would be nice to see apologies coming from other sides as well, particularly since the Serbian people have been the most displaced nation in the former Yugoslavia, because hundreds and hundreds of Serbs had been expelled from where they had been living for centuries and thousands, perhaps even tens of thousands were murdered. Contrary to what the West portrays, that the Serbs just woke up one day and decided to have a Greater Serbia, thus murdering other peace loving ethnic groups, the truth is that multiple wars in Yugoslavia (and the war in Bosnia) was a brutal civil war in which INDIVIDUALS on all sides have committed attrocities and in which all sides have suffered, but only the Serbs have been punished - by demonization in the Western media (often by lies, misinformation or deception of the public by twisting facts or deliberately telling lies), by crippling sanctions and then by Nato's bombs. The real cause of the Yugoslav civil wars was violent secession of various ethnic groups from what used to be the only legitimate and internationally recognized entity - Yugoslavia. And the West activelly participated in demolishing a sovereign European country. And you should know that Serbia and Montenegro is today the only truly multinational, multicultural and multi-religious society in the former Yugoslavia, in which many minorities live in relatively good harmony. All other post-Yugoslav states are either etnically pure states, such as Croatia or Kosovo (not a state), or strictly ethnically divided states such as Bosnia and Macedonia.

When all these questions are asked, it would appear that many of those questions do not have answers. Although Serbia and most Serbs are generally ready to deal with issues of the past, and most really regret what happened in Srebrenica, clearly there are issues that do not fit the puzzle, which indicate that what really happened in Srebrenica is not as simple as the West portrays it to be, and that it requires a deep analysis, fair and objective, which the West has not at all been during the Yugoslav conflicts.