A Voice in the Srebrenica Silence

The woman, whose identity is known to the editorial board of BIRN Justice Report, has never before publicly shared her experiences of what happened to her during the Srebrenica genocide in July 1995.

The fact that she finds it hard to recall those memories and that she tries to avoid the subject are the reasons for why she has not spoken out about it or reported it to the police.

“I have never contacted the Prosecution because they may not believe me. They may say that I am making things up. Some witnesses, however, saw how I looked at the time. I am still afraid. I cannot speak. I have forgotten certain details… But, you cannot forget that thing…It is hard,” says the woman, who was raped by a soldier whom she is unable to recognize now.

We are sharing her entire story but we will protect her identity due to the trauma she went through.

“I used to live in Prohici in a house by the lake, near the Perucac dam. I moved to there when I got married in 1987. My children were born later on… I did not work but we lived a good life. We had land and cattle. Our life was nice.

I remember the year when the war began. It was spring. We seeded potatoes and beans. But all of that stayed behind…

There is a mountain above the lake. They began shooting from the mountain. In the beginning we found it interesting to watch the falling grenades. We could see them being fired from Serbia and exploding in the vicinity of our houses. We would come out and saw the flames. One day seven grenades fell near our house. We began seeking shelter. I was hiding in caves with my children. We used to sleep in a watermill. My husband and neighbours kept some sort of guard.

All of us, the village residents, moved towards Srebrenica a short time later. We joined the others, because we did not want to stay alone.

At that time I thought that everything would be over soon and that we would go back to our houses. My husband used to go back to our house in order to fetch food…There was no food in Srebrenica. People suffered because they had nothing to eat. We lacked flour the most. And salt too.

Six of us lived in one house. We had a cow for a certain period of time, but somebody stole it. We got along somehow. My sister had a sewing machine, so she made some clothes, which I exchanged for flour.

We would also go to Zepa in order to get some food. We used to walk to Zepa the whole night, take some food and travel back the following night. My husband went to Zepa several times. I only went twice. During one of my two trips to Zepa, we were ambushed. It was dangerous. My mother-in-law thought that I was killed. But several of us managed to get away somehow.

On the day of the fall of Srebrenica, July 11, 1995, my husband came back after having kept watch. I remember that he brought some canned food and said: “Save this for the children”. He told me: “Take care of the children. See you in Tuzla”.

He went with other men through the woods. I walked to Potocari for about an hour with our children, while grenades were falling around us. We were so afraid that we did not look around very much. I was just trying to keep my children close. When we arrived in Potocari, we entered a building where the floor was flooded.

I left my children with some old people and a cousin of mine and went to the field to fetch some hay, so my children could sleep on it.

Some soldiers came by. They took him above the house and me to another side of the house. The soldier was young. I would not be able to recognize him now. He took me to a room and pointed his gun towards me. He tore my shirt off.

I had a white shirt. I was wearing two trousers as well. He told me to pull my trousers off but I was so afraid that I was not able to do it. He tore everything off. I know that he asked me something, but I…I became numb due to the huge fear.

I just kept thinking about my children. I said to myself “He will kill me. My children will stay alone. There is nobody to take care of them”. I prayed to God not to let him kill me, to let me go.

Luckily, somebody called his name, so I went out. My body was black…I could not say a word. I just cried. That was all I could do. I just told my sister-in-law not to go close to that house as they could do the same thing to her.

My father-in-law, who thought that I was crying because of my husband, comforted me, telling me that we would be reunited soon.

Later that night I covered my children, because some soldiers had come in order to check if anybody was there… I went out in the morning. I headed towards the buses with my children. We got on a bus. I gave my son to my mother-in-law. When we arrived in Tuzla, I searched for my husband and waited for him.

He did not come. We buried him in Potocari two years ago. His body was found in Kamenica. My cousin, brother-in-law, his 17-year old son and my father-in-law, whom they did not allow to join us on a bus from Potocari to Tuzla, were killed. My father-in-law was born in 1932. I remember him holding my daughter’s hand and watching her, when they separated him from us.