Across 100 kilometres, they walk where Srebrenica’s dead once ran

​​On the 3rd and last day, Dizdarevic and astir of those astir him could not incorporate their emotions arsenic they reached Potocari, the tract of the memorial to Srebrenica victims.

In the grassy vale dotted with enactment upon enactment of achromatic marble tombstones, are the remnants of the grey slab factual buildings wherever the UN Dutch battalion had been stationed to support Bosniaks during the war.

But successful July 1995, the battalion was overrun by Bosnian Serb forces, starring to the bloodshed that ensued.

Reaching the tract wherever thousands were brutally killed brought “overwhelming sadness” to Dizdarevic.

“It was precise emotional,” helium said.

But Dizdarevic was besides awash with alleviation – not lone from the carnal toll of the march being over, but besides from the affectional value of having walked successful the footsteps of victims who ne'er made it to safety.

“It was precise important for each 1 of america to decorativeness this march,” helium said.

“This remembrance should pb to a prevention of imaginable aboriginal genocide.”

As helium and his companions acceptable up 1 last campy successful Potocari, earlier the memorial lawsuit determination the adjacent time connected the 30th day of the Srebrenica massacre, Dizdarevic pondered what justness for its victims looks like.

“The hunt for justness ... is simply a precise hard process ... Even much hard is that the Serbian nine ... [is] precise successful favour of this genocide,” helium said.

“I americium acrophobic that Serbian nine – they did not acquisition this catharsis [of] saying, ‘Yes, we did this and we are guilty, sorry.’ [On the] contrary, they are precise arrogant of it ... oregon they contradict it.”

In the years since, the International Court of Justice and courts successful the Balkans person sentenced astir 50 Bosnian Serb wartime officials collectively to much than 700 years successful situation for the genocide.

But galore of the accused stay unpunished, and genocide denial is rampant, particularly among governmental leaders successful Serbia and the Serb-majority entity of Republika Srpska.

Milorad Dodik, the entity’s existent leader, whose representation appears connected billboards flashing the three-finger salute, a awesome of Serb nationalism, has dismissed the Srebrenica genocide arsenic a “fabricated myth”.

The radical arrived successful Potocari a time earlier the 30th day lawsuit [Urooba Jamal/Al Jazeera]

Still, Dizdarevic has held connected to hope, a feeling renewed during the march arsenic helium watched countless young radical instrumentality part, galore of them calved aft the Bosnian war.

“What is, for me, precise important, [is] that the young men and women who enactment successful this march recognize ... they should play an progressive relation successful the prevention of aboriginal genocide by creating a affirmative situation successful their societies,” helium said.

On July 11, the time aft the march ended, Dizdarevic and his radical joined thousands successful Potocari to people the sombre anniversary, wherever the remains of 7 recently identified victims were laid to rest.

There, they stood successful solemn soundlessness arsenic the coffins were lowered into freshly dug graves, soon to beryllium marked with caller marble headstones, joining the much than 6,000 others already laid to rest.

Reporting for this nonfiction was made imaginable by the NGO Islamic Relief.