Image: Straziste cemetery(Photo credits: Velija Hasanbegovic)

The Straziste cemetery is located in Visegrad on the left side of the main road towards Dobrun and Uzice.  It is the central Muslim cemetery in Visegrad. Judging by the old Ottoman tombstones, it can be said that Straziste is one of the oldest in Visegrad. It is a large cemetery – the perimeter is one kilometer long.  This cemetery is of great importance for Bosniaks for one more reason – the martyrs  of Visegrad are buried there.

Not all of the martyrs are buried in Straziste – some families decided not to bury there loved ones in Visegrad. Mainly because Visegrad is a Serb town today  and they do not wish to return to Visegrad anymore. Another reason is that in the years after the war, the Visegrad victim organization did not have a strong opinion on this matter nor did it understand the importance of burying the martyrs of Visegrad in Visegrad. As a result most of the victims were buried in Sarajevo, some in Gorazde and a few even in Visoko.

Today the opinion of some has changed and there are ideas that Straziste cemetery should be transformed into a memorial center for the genocide victims.

Building a memorial center for the victims would bring dignity back to them and satisfaction for the family members. Our hope is that Straziste would become the Potocari of Visegrad.

Image: Straziste cemetery (Photo credits: Berina Pekmezovic)

Klotjevac is a small village situated on the Drina River, directly south of Srebrenica. During the genocide in 1992, the village was continually shelled by Bosnian Serb forces. Inhabitants of Klotjevac managed to pulled out of the Drina several massacred bodies. Three of these bodies belonged to Visegrad genocide victims. Klotjevac – Prohici, after Slap and Barimo is the third known place where bodies of Visegrad genocide victims were pulled out of the Drina and buried.

Many thanks to the inhabitants of Klotjevac.

Visegrad genocide victims buried in Klotjevac.

1. Dzafic(Meho) Ekrem, 17.05.1956, Visegrad

2.Dzafic(Medo)Meho, 13.01.1931, Holijaci, Visegrad

3.Ahmetspahic Hasan, 03.03.1953, Visegrad

Hasan (Ibrahim) Kustura 1959-1992

exhumed in Slap, Zepa.

Image: The Sijercic-bey’s shrine in Visegrad before the war.

The Sijercic-bey’s shrine ( “Turbe Sijercic bega”) in Visegrad was built during the Ottoman period. Not much is known about it. It was bulldozed in 1992 by the Bosnian Serb authorities in Visegrad.

Image: The site where the shrine used to stand.

Amir (Camil) Kurtalic 1943-1992

Hasan(Abdulah)Mutapcic 1952-1992

exhumed in Visegrad; Kam.Tocilo – Luke in 2000.

Ekrem (Meho) Dzafic 1956-1992

Meho (Medo) Dzafic 1931 – 1992

The first indictment for crimes committed against girls and young women kept in the Vilina Vlas ‘rape camp’ near Visegrad, eastern Bosnia, has been confirmed by the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo.Oliver Krsmanovic was a close ally of Bosnian Serb commander Milan Lukic, sentenced to life imprisonment by the ICTY.  

By Nidzara Ahmetasevic in Sarajevo

Human torch
Krsmanovic, according to this indictment, was a member of the 2nd Podrinjska Light Infantry Brigade of the Army of Republika Srpska from 1992 to 1995. He is indicted for crimes against humanity and violating the laws and practices of warfare. The prosecution claims Krsmanovic “perpetrated and aided in the perpetration of murders and enforced disappearances of the non-Serb civilian population of Višegrad”. They will try to prove that he participated in “severe deprivation of physical liberty and other inhumane acts intentionally causing strong bodily and mental pain and suffering” of civilians.
[related-articles]According to this indictment, Krsmanovic on 27 June 1992, together with Lukić and members of his group, imprisoned 70 Bosnian Muslim civilians in the settlement of Bikavac where they were locked in a house and burned alive.

Sjeverin massacre
Krsmanovic was free until May this year even though he was sentenced to 20 years imprisonment in 2003 in Serbia for participating, again with Lukic, in the massacre on 22 October 1992 of 16 Bosnian Muslims from the village of Sjeverin. They were abducted from the village of Mioce, and taken to Vilina Vlas where they were tortured and later executed at the banks of the river Drina.
Krsmanovic may become the first ever person to be sentenced for crimes commited in Vilina Vlas, the place where during 1992 more than 200 girls and women were kept, some of them for more than one month, brutally tortured and repeatedly raped. Some of the victims were as young as 12. According to association Women Victims of War, only four women survived this rape camp.

The lake
The bodies of others have still not been found, but it is believed that some could be identified among bodily remains found this year at the bottom of the Lake of Perucac, near Visegrad.
One of them, A.T. – a protected witness in one of the Visegrad-related cases before the Court of BiH, told this author that she was kept in a room with four other women, kept in handcuffs and gang-raped daily. “They abused us in unspeakable ways. They burned me with cigarettes, cut my body with a knife and ripped flesh from my mouth.
“We couldn’t talk. We just stared into a point in the corner, crayed and completely lost. We didn’t know what time it was. The only time we knew was when they came for us,” she recalled.
Even though survivors spoke about Lukic’s role in establishing and running this camp, he was not indicted by the ICTY for crimes in Vilina Vlas. Years ago, asked by victims’ assosiations why Lukic was not indicted for Vilina Vlas crimes, foremer chief prosecutor in The Hague Carla del Ponte, said that the prosecution could not find enough witnesses to come forward with such evidence.

Detention
Krsmanovic is currently in detention after the State prosecution in Bosnia claimed that some of the potential witnesses in this case had asked for protection because they were afraid of the suspect.
Until his arrest, Krsmanovic lived freely in Visegrad. After his arrest, he said that he had lived in his house in Visegrad and that nobody ever came to look for him until May this year. The association Women Victims of War has repeatedly asked for this arrest over the years.

Source

Image: Son, Mother and Daugther. Enver, Djulsa and Munevera Sabanija.

Enver(Salko)Sabanija 1972-1992

Djulsa(Halid)Sabanija 1953-1992

Munevera(Salko)Sabanija 1970-1992

An entire family wiped out. Their remains have still not been found.

Remember The Visegrad Genocide!

Never forget!

Never forgive!