UPDATE FROM THE 80TH MASS GRAVE
PHOTO: Forensic experts (from left to right) Edo Smajilovic, Admir Jugo and Matthew Vennemayer, of the International Commission for Missing Persons ICMP search for body remains in the Zalazje Mass Grave on December 3 2009.
The blook-soaked region of Podrinje (the Drina Valley) continues to yield remains of brutally massacred Bosnian Muslim victims. In World War II, for example, Serbian Chetniks who collaborated with Nazi German fascists committed genocide against Bosniaks in this region (see: 1943 genocide of Bosniaks around Srebrenica). And again, from 1992-95, Serb forces slaughtered at least 24,117 Bosniaks in this region, according to the Research and Documentation Center in Sarajevo.
Forensic experts have continued exhumations from the Zalazje mass grave today. So far, remains of 98 human skeletons were found, according to Lejla Cengic, spokesperson of the BiH Institute for Missing Persons. She stated that Zalazje "is a very large secondary mass grave with victims from Srebrenica from 1995." More human remains are expected to be unearthed from this mass grave. PHOTO: Forensic experts of the International Commission for Missing Persons ICMP search for body remains at a mass-grave site in the remote mountain area of the village of Zalazje near the Eastern-Bosnian town of Srebrenica, 80 km north east of Sarajevo, Bosnia, Thursday, Dec. 3, 2009. Forensic experts started exhuming the 80th mass grave that contains remains of Bosnian Muslims civilians killed in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre. Amor Masovic, the head of the Institute for Missing People, said 100 bags with remains were taken out from the grave and sent to the lab for a DNA analysis and identification. Some 100 bags with remains of the Srebrenica genocide victims have been taken out from the Zalazje mass grave and sent for DNA analysis and identification, said Amor Masovic the head of the Institute for Missing People. Eight complete and 77 parts of bodies and 12 isolated bones were exhumed today. PHOTO: Bosnian forensic expert Edo Smajilovic of the International Commission for Missing Persons ICMP search for body remains at a mass-grave site in the remote mountain area of the village of Zalazje near the Eastern-Bosnian town of Srebrenica on December 3, 2009.
Zalazje is the 80th mass grave containing the remains of the Bosniak civilians killed in the July 1995 Srebrenica genocide, said Masovic. "The grave contains remains of victims belonging to 1000 Srebrenica Bosniaks that had been killed in the Kravica agricultural warehouse. Currently we are working on the removal of another level of soil in the grave where we expect to find more remains." 
Masovic said that the bodies of 6,200 victims killed in the Srebrenica massacre have been exhumed so far. Despite bad weather, the forensic team from Tuzla will continue exhumation process next week.
Srebrenica 1992-1995: How it all started?
From 1992-1995 Serbs from heavily militarized villages around Srebrenica had forced approximately 40,000 Bosnian Muslim refugees to live in the Srebrenica ghetto with little or no means of survival. The number of refugees increased to 80,000 by winter 1992/93.
Serb Army stationed around Srebrenica never demilitarized, even though they were required to do so under the 1993 demilitarization agreements. Furthermore, Serbs around Srebrenica constantly attacked neighbouring Bosnian Muslim villages, frequently bombarding them from air and with Serbian airplanes. More than 400 Bosnian Muslim villages were destroyed around Srebrenica in 1992 with at least 11,000 Bosniaks killed in Podrinje (region encompasing Srebrenica).
In July 1995 the Bosnian Serb army staged a brutal takeover of Srebrenica and its surrounding area, where they proceeded to perpetrate genocide. Bosnian Serb soldiers and paramilitary thugs, both groups commonly known as "Chetniks," separated Bosniak families, forcibly expelled 30,000 Bosniaks, and summarily executed at least 8,372 Bosnian Muslims - boys, men, and the elderly.
PHOTO: Forensic experts (from left to right) Edo Smajilovic, Admir Jugo and Matthew Vennemayer, of the International Commission for Missing Persons ICMP search for body remains at a mass-grave site in the remote mountain area of the village of Zalazje near the Eastern-Bosnian town of Srebrenica on December 3 2009.
PHOTO: Bosnian forensic experts of the International Commission for Missing Persons ICMP search for body remains at a mass-grave site in the remote mountain area of the village of Zalazje near the Eastern-Bosnian town of Srebrenica on December 3 2009.
Related:
Zalazje Mass Grave Excavation in Progress, read here.
Vidikovac Mass Grave Expected to Hold Large Number of Victims, read here.
posted by Srebrenica Genocide at 11:27 AM
7 Comments:
Experts exhume 80th Srebrenica mass grave
By AIDA CERKEZ-ROBINSON
Associated Press Writer
SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) - Forensic experts exhumed Thursday the 80th mass grave contaning the remains of Muslim Bosniak civilians killed in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, an official said.
Some 100 bags with remains were taken out from the grave near the town of Srebrenica and sent for DNA analysis and identification, said Amor Masovic the head of the Institute for Missing Persons.
In 1995, Bosnian Serb troops overran the Srebrenica, which the United Nations had declared a safe zone, and killed as many as 8,000 men and boys, in what is the worst mass killing in Europe since World War II. Their bodies were dumped in a number of mass graves.
After the end of the war and following international pressure to investigate and punish Bosnia's wartime atrocities, Serbs dug up some of the bodies and scattered them in other mass graves.
Masovic said that the bodies of 6,200 victims killed in the Srebrenica massacre have been exhumed so far.
As the heavy equipment, including bulldozers, was usually used to move bodies from one grave to another, parts from a single body are sometimes found in several different mass graves.
The mixtures of bones are usually taken in bags to a laboratory where experts extract the DNA from each bone in order to put a skeleton together like a puzzle.
The victim's DNA is also compared with that extracted from the blood of relatives of missing people and when a match is found, the body is returned to the family. Bosnia's DNA lab has a database of over 100,000 DNA samples of people who miss a relative.
In the latest grave to be exhumed Thursday, Masovic's experts found pieces of concrete and broken tiles that indicate the victims were killed in agricultural warehouse in a nearby village.
After rounding up the captured men from Srebrenica, Bosnian Serb special forces imprisoned over 1,000 of them at the warehouse in the village of Kravica and then used automatic weapons, hand grenades, and other weapons to kill them. They used bulldozers to dump the victims'bodies in mass graves and later relocate them again to other sites.
How much evidence does it take to tell Diana Johnstone which side of the truth she's opted for? And I wonder if Lewis MacKenzie has an opinion on why so many bulldozer reburials were necessary?
Owen, deniers not only distort the truth about the 1995 genocide, but also events preceding the genocide. They usually blame Naser Oric for (counter)-attacking Serb villages around Srebrenica, but they never mention 260 Bosniak villages and hamlets [around Srebrenica and neighbouring municipalities] that were torched by Serb forces from April to June 1992 (three years before the genocide). Deniers also tend to use other idiotic arguments to present Oric (and Muslims in general) as killers.
Oric allegedly confessed killing Goran Zekic - militant Chetnik who received training from Serbia in 1989. All ultranationalist Serbs held the highest posts in the municipality. Zekic held the post of a judge in Srebrenica. He was one of key planners of militant attacks on Srebrenica civilians in 1992. Zekic received arms and training from Serbia in 1989. He prepared well for the war. Goran Zekic wanted to eradicate Srebrenica of its Bosniak-majority population. Thanks God Naser Oric killed him in combat.
Deniers also convinently omit other facts, like the fact that Srebrenica enclave was an open-air prison, besieged by Serb forces and shelled on a daily basis. Serbs around Srebrenica never demilitarized, even though they were required to do so under the 1993 demilitarization agreements. According to the Research and Documentation Center, Serbs slaughtered more than 24,000 Bosniaks in the Drina Valley of Podrinje.
Owen, if you can spin the Srebenica story in such a way that makes the United States look bad without vindicating people like Samantha Power, I am sure Chomsky, Johnstone, and her ilk would quickly change their tune.
Also, has anyone actually asked the deniers their opinions since these mass graves have become common knowledge? You know, ring them up and ask, "has the discovery of the 80th massive grave around Srebrenica influenced your opinion on the events that took place there?
Another point, has anyone else ever noticed that the many of the people who excuse or minimize the events of Srebenica by citing the nonsense about Orac reference here in the comments here by the esteemed blog editor, never extend the same consideration to the Croatians after Storm or Medak Pocket or say Americans after 9-11?
History Punk,
Let me quote Naser Oric's words:
"And since I am a soldier, I know that Serbs... true Serbs who are also soldiers, know well that I fought them fair and square on a battlefield. Therefore, I don't think they are jelaous because of my acquittal; they knew for a long that I was never a war criminal, and that I was a soldier fighting on a battlefield for survival, and nothing else."
Naser Oric had a warm post-war relationship with both Slobodan Milosevic and his son Marko. Marko Milosevic supported Naser Oric thoughout his trial. They were in constant telephone communication according to the Serbian state prosecutor Bruno Vukaric. Milosevic's son Marko even congratulated Oric on his acquittal of all charges in relation to defence of the Srebrenica enclave.
History Punk, Chomsky has a way round these things - "awful things happened and so on and so forth, I've discussed these things, it was grim but ... " and then back to the GPS.
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