Nermin Subašić was only 19 years old when paramilitary groups butchered him and scattered his bones in and around Srebrenica. Nermin was not the only one. More than 8,300 men, women and children were brutally slaughtered during the Srebrenica genocide, one of the darkest most heinous pages of Europe’s recent history. Their stories might have been forgotten if it were not for the Mothers of Srebrenica and Žepa.
These mothers, wives, and sisters have wiped away their tears and given their suffering a purpose. Not seeking revenge, for 24 years they have been relentlessly calling for justice. And they have a message for us: stop dehumanising the Other.
Many do not know and do not want to know about the Srebrenica genocide. Others think that it was a local issue, an accident of history that does not bear relevance for the rest of the world. This mindset is not only one of disinterest or relativism: it also reveals the underlying anti-Muslim feeling so common in Europe. The Srebrenica genocide undeniably had a religious matrix. Those human beings were killed only because they were Muslims. And this happened with the complicity of a passive international community which knew what was happening but chose to look away.
