The Acting President of the Republic of Kosovo, Albulena Haxhiu, participated tonight at the commemorative event on the 31st anniversary of the genocide in Srebrenica.
In her address to the participants, Acting President Haxhiu said that “Never Again” was the commitment made by Europe and the international community after the Holocaust, a crime that showed how far a state can go when it turns hatred into ideology and extermination into politics.
According to her, fifty years later, that commitment was put to the test and failed in Srebrenica.
“Today, on the 31st anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide, the Republic of Kosovo humbly honors the victims of Srebrenica and stands with the families who have been seeking justice, truth and peace for more than three decades. We, in Kosovo, know what it means to be driven from our homes, to lose our loved ones, to wait for news from mass graves and to live without knowing where our loved ones are. We also know the weight of the timely intervention of the international community to stop the campaign of ethnic cleansing, genocide and murder,” said Acting President Haxhiu.
For this reason, according to Acting President Haxhiu, Srebrenica remains one of the most serious failures of international protection.
She said that every guarantee that could make a person believe that they were protected was violated there, from the presence of the United Nations to the word given.
“Srebrenica had been declared a UN-protected area, with the promise that civilians would be safe and that the international presence would protect them from attack. In Potocari, thousands of them sought refuge near the UN peacekeeping base. But the promised protection failed precisely when it was needed most. After occupying the posts of the Dutch UN battalion, Serbian forces took, in some cases at gunpoint, the peacekeepers’ uniforms, equipment and vehicles, which they then used to create the false impression that the surrender was secure. In July 1995, the place where people had sought refuge became the scene of one of the worst crimes in Europe since the Second World War,” said Acting President Haxhiu.
According to her, the crime in Srebrenica was based on the destruction of any moral orientation that a person has to distinguish safety from danger.
“The perpetrators of the genocide were not satisfied with capturing and killing thousands of Bosnian men and boys, but they turned even the closest human bond, the trust of a son in his father, into a death trap. Thousands of men and boys were trying to reach Tuzla through the forests, in the hope that it was the only way to salvation. Serbian forces forced the captured men to call their sons, fathers and relatives out of the forest, telling them that they would be safe. Some of those who surrendered were killed immediately, while thousands of others were held captive, taken to places prepared for execution and systematically killed,” said Acting President Haxhiu.
She further added that after the killings, Bosnian Serb military and police structures moved the bodies from primary graves to secondary graves, in an attempt to hide the traces of the crime.
According to Acting President Haxhiu, the attempt to hide the truth then continued through the denial of genocide and the relativization of the responsibility of the perpetrators, adding that the same thing had been perpetrated in Kosovo during the war, by the same country, Serbia.
“The denial of genocide and the elevation of convicted war criminals to a pedestal not only violates the memory of the victims. It undoes the work of justice and keeps present the mentality that preceded the crime. Ratko Mladić and Radovan Karadžić were sentenced to life imprisonment by international justice. But when the facts proven by international courts are presented as a matter of opinion, the way is opened for the criminals to become examples for the younger generations. Kosovo knows this danger well. We know what propaganda brings when it becomes part of state policy”, emphasized Acting President Haxhiu.
Acting President Haxhiu further said that the Republic of Kosovo stands with Bosnia and Herzegovina, the survivors and the families of the victims, we support their right to justice, to memory and to a future in which the victims and their families are not forced to endlessly testify to the crime, loss and truth that the courts have already proven.
“Without the truth that the Mothers of Srebrenica have defended for more than three decades, there can be neither justice nor peace. International justice has convicted eighteen people for the crimes committed in Srebrenica. What remains to be judged today is the willingness of societies and institutions to break away from the legacy of crime. When convicted criminals are presented as heroes, not only is the past distorted. The message is sent to the new generations that crime can be justified, that the victim can be forgotten and that responsibility can be turned into pride. This is unacceptable for any society that aims for peace and democracy,” said Acting President Haxhiu.
