“We won’t forget, and we won’t stay silent”: London’s Bosnian community marks 30th anniversary of Srebrenica genocide
On Saturday, July 12, the Bosnian Canadian Islamic Centre (BCIC) held a memorial in the Rayner Gardens area of Springbank Park to mark 30 years since the devastating events of the Srebrenica genocide. As the hot midday sun bore down on the attendees, members of the BCIC, local MPs, City officials, and Muslim community leaders spoke on the importance of remembrance and recognition in preserving the memory of the victims and ensuring the atrocities of that day are never repeated again.
In April of 1993, a year into the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the UN declared the town of Srebrenica and the surrounding area a “safe zone” that would be protected from incursion by the Army of Republika Srpska, the military arm of the Bosnian Serb state entity. Despite this, on July 11, 1995, the approximately 400 Dutch peacekeepers from UNPROFOR stationed in Srebrenica stood by and watched as general Ratko Mladić and his forces marched into the town unopposed.
In less than 72 hours, they would go on to massacre over 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys.
More than 23,000 people were rounded up to be deported from the town, with women and girls facing horrific acts of gang rape and torture while in detention. Approximately 15,000 civilians managed to escape the deportation and killings, attempting to flee 55 kilometers to the nearest Muslim-majority region of Tuzla. Along the way, they were ambushed by Serb forces, with only 3,000 surviving to reach safety.
While the International Court of Justice eventually convicted the Army of Republika Srpska of the crime of genocide in 2007, it was not until May of last year that the UN General Assembly formally recognized the events in Srebrenica as a genocide. The decision provoked considerable controversy due to objections from Serbia and its allies, with 84 votes in favour, 19 against, and 68 abstentions. For many Bosniaks it was a bittersweet relief, coming after years of denial and downplaying of the atrocities committed against their people.
Local recognition and the pain of denial
Last year was also the first time a memorial ceremony for the genocide was officially recognized by the City of London, following a long period of consultation with the local Bosnian community. While the Canadian government has recognized the events in Srebrenica as a genocide since 2010, and the City of London proclaimed July 11 a Day for the Commemoration of the Srebrenica Genocide in 2020, it was only in late December of 2023 that the City finally approved the installation of a physical monument to the victims around which a ceremony could be held.
The monument, a bench and plaque installed next to the fish pond in Rayner Gardens, is now the second in Canada dedicated to the victims of the Srebrenica genocide, after the first was erected in Windsor in 2016. But even this humble symbol of remembrance could not avoid attempts at being silenced.
“When I say ‘denial’, I will tell you the story,” said Avdija Ramić, Imam of the BCIC, in his speech at the memorial. “On Thursday they installed the bench. On Friday […] I announced in Salat al-Jumu’ah [Friday prayer] how we have a memorial bench here, and please go there and make du’a for our martyrs. […] On Saturday morning I received a call from a guy who said: ‘Imam, where is the bench?’ I said, ‘City Garden Complex, just go to the fish pond, you will find it across from the Canadian flag.’ He said, ‘Imam, yes, I’m here in the park, but there is no bench.’ I said ‘Don’t make a joke, please.’ He said ‘No, Imam, there is no joke.’ All the benches around were there; this one was gone. So that’s denial. That’s denial.”
Though the perpetrator of the theft was never identified, the City quickly replaced the stolen bench, and it has since stood undamaged. But the Bosnian community knows all too well that this is just one manifestation of a long history of suppression.
Previous attempts to recognize Srebrenica in the UN were shot down by dissenting parties including Russia, Serbia, and their allies. When last year’s resolution was introduced, thousands of Bosnian Serbs took to the streets in protest, and Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik threatened secession of Bosnian Serb-controlled areas from the rest of Bosnia and Herzegovina if it was passed. Even the Bosnian Serb mayor of Srebrenica itself from 2016 to 2024 refused the label of “genocide” for the massacre that took place in his city, enspousing conspiracy theories that the documented events were an “imposed story” and a “Hague farce”.
Meanwhile, revelation of the genocide’s true toll continues, as every year more victims are identified through discovery of unmarked mass graves in Bosnia and DNA analysis of bone fragments. This year alone, seven newly-identified victims were laid to rest in Srebrenica, ranging in age from two young men of 19 to the oldest, a grandmother of 67. Their names were Senajid Husein Avdić, born 1976; Hariz Ramiz Mujić, born 1976; Fata Huso Bektić, born 1928; Hasib Adem Omerović, born 1961; Sejdalija Alija Alić, born 1961; Rifet Mustafa Gabeljić, born 1964; and Amir Ibrahim Mujčić, born 1964.
An emblem of remembrance
On Friday, July 11 — the anniversary of Srebrenica — Islamic Relief Canada (IRC) hosted a workshop at the BCIC to create white and green flower pins commemorating the victims of the genocide, based on a design by Jasmina Camdzic and the association Gračaničko keranje (“Gračanica Crochet”). The workshop participants made crocheted and jeweled-brooch versions of the pins, which were offered by donation at the memorial the next day to support the BCIC’s work.
Islamic Relief has been a key ally in responding to and healing from the genocide, both in the 1990s as one of the first Muslim NGOs on the ground while the war was still raging, and into the present.
“30 years later, we’re still there; not just as an organization, but as a committed partner in rebuilding what was torn apart,” said Saimah Sarwar, IRC’s Regional Manager for Western Ontario. The organization recently launched a $500,000 project in northeast Bosnia to help 170 families with animals, seeds, farm equipment and training to restore their way of life. A contingent from IRC, including several Londoners, was also present in Srebrenica on the day of the memorial, participating in the burial ceremony for the martyrs.
Within living memory
The massacre in Srebrenica was just one part in a broader effort by the Bosnian Serb and Croat militaries to ethnically cleanse Bosnia of its Muslim population. By the end of 1995, after three years of war, more than 100,000 people had been killed, at least 70 percent of them ethnic Bosniaks.
Ramić was six years old when the war broke out, and recalls with a grim expression the difficulties he and his family faced.
“The worst trauma was struggling for food. Because sometimes, I remember very well—four days I didn’t have anything to eat. Even if you find one piece of bread on the street, you think, like, ‘wow!’”
Mensud Devic, another survivor of the war and president of the organizing committee for the Windsor Srebrenica memorial, also spoke on the conditions he endured, stressing the difficulty in conveying their severity to those who have only ever known peace. “Many of you, you can’t comprehend how horrific war is. All the movies and the technology cannot bring to you the reality of war, the atrocity of war.”
“So many thousands of civilians flocked to Srebrenica seeking shelter and safety; all of them were captured. They were promised safety. In return, they were exposed to torture.”
The long fight for justice
The speeches at the memorial repeatedly emphasized the importance of naming those responsible for the massacres at Srebrenica and throughout the Bosnian War, ensuring justice was adequately served. In her remarks, MPP (NDP) of London West Peggy Sattler stated that she shared the resolve of London’s Bosnian community to “learn from the lessons of the past so that we can prevent future genocide, and that means naming genocide when it is happening. It means acting immediately to prevent genocide. And it means holding accountable those individuals who are responsible for committing genocide.”
Although the Army of Republika Srpska were the main perpetrators of atrocities in Srebrenica and across Bosnia and Herzegovina, citizens from countries around the world descended on the former territory of Yugoslavia between 1991 and 1995 to participate in the wars of independence. Many joined local militias or went as peacekeepers, assisting UN forces in enforcing buffer zones and providing protection to civilians. But in Bosnia, some also joined on the side of the Army of Republika Srpska, aiding and abetting their war crimes.
“I’m not supposed to say, but I’m not afraid—even 10 Canadian citizens, they have been charged already, there are charges against them, about going to Bosnia, paying the Serb[s], killing live targets… killing Bosnians,” said Ramić.
Ramić was referring to several cases of Canadian citizens accused or convicted of involvement in war crimes in Bosnia, including some who have since been deported to face trial in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Others like Lewis MacKenzie, a former general in the Canadian military, have been accused of facilitating the massacre of Bosniak Muslims through passivity during the early stages of the war, and of contributing to denial of the genocide in the years afterward.
From Srebrenica to Palestine
A similar pattern has been playing out in Palestine for decades, where Canadian citizens have travelled to Israel to join the Israel Defense Forces as “lone soldiers” — some involved in carrying out war crimes against the Palestinian people — and then returned home to civilian life, expecting to be absorbed quietly back into society. Only recently have there been hints the Canadian government is investigating and may hold some of them accountable for their actions.
Ramić can’t help but see the parallels.
“It’s not only that there were Serbian forces—mainly, but there were a lot of [foreign] helpers. The same thing is happening in Gaza!”
Khalil Al Tarhuni, a Palestinian born during the Nakba in 1948 and speaker at the event, concurred. Reflecting on the connections between the events of the Bosnian war and the crimes committed against his own people, he recalled witnessing on television the aftermath of the 1992 shelling of a marketplace in Sarajevo as people waited in line for bread, leaving 26 civilians dead and more than 100 injured. He was immediately reminded of a story his father told him about an incident that happened in his hometown of Deir al-Balah when he was just 40 days old: there, too, hundreds of people were gathered in the weekly market, buying and selling goods, when without warning bombs were dropped on them by Israeli planes, instantly killing dozens.
Al Tarhuni also sees the past echo into the present as the world watches the genocide unfolding in Gaza. “There was [news from] all over the world: ‘there is a siege of [Srebrenica], it happened there.’ And in [front of] the eyes of United Nations troops they did the massacre, exactly the same as what’s happening now. We have live cameras, we have live broadcasting, from Al Jazeera, from many different TV stations, showing how it is there in Gaza. Approximately 100 people are killed every day. During the time we are talking now, some people are dying, some people are starving, some people are in the hospital, some kids have no milk, […] and they die of starvation and malnutrition. This is what’s happening here.”
Elma Brakic, co-emcee and one of organizers of the memorial, elaborated on these shared experiences, drawing links between the events in Srebrenica and ongoing atrocities across the globe that have been largely ignored by western governments. “Srebrenica is not just a Bosnian story—it’s a warning to the entire human race. While we say ‘never again’ in Potočari, children are being burned alive in Gaza, women are being raped in Sudan, villages are being razed in Tigray, people are stateless and persecuted in Myanmar; different names, different places, but the same pattern of dehumanization, indifference, and denial.”
“We can no longer afford to wait until it’s too late to call it genocide. We can’t keep lighting candles after the fact and patting ourselves on the back for being aware,” she said. “Awareness without action is a privilege in disguise.”
Before making supplications for the martyrs, Imam Nedžad Hafizovic of the Bosnian Islamic Centre in Toronto reaffirmed the importance of learning from history. “Srebrenica is not just a story about the past: it is a warning. It is our duty to ensure that this story does not go silent—not to spread hate, but to seek the truth and justice. Srebrenica teaches that silence kills. Today, we must not remain silent, whether injustice is happening in Palestine, in Africa, in prison, in our neighbourhood. We speak, we write, we teach, and we pray.”
Lasting impacts and the echoes of hate
Despite decades of international efforts towards reconciliation and accountability for the crimes of the war, the future of the Bosniak people in their homeland is anything but secured. Over 150,000 Bosnian Muslims still live in Serbia today, in addition to 440,000 in the Serbian-majority Republika Srpska, one of the two constituent entities of Bosnia and Herzegovina established in the 1995 Dayton Agreement that ended the war. Brakic noted that Bosniaks within this territory still face “high unemployment rates, with many systematically excluded from public-sector jobs.” Other continuing injustices prevent a return to a peaceful life: “Mosques that were destroyed during the war remain in ruins, while memorials for convicted war criminals are erected. Those that have returned face harassment and threats, while the government of Republika Srpska pushes for secession, undermining Bosnia’s fragile peace, mirroring the steps that led to war.”
“This genocide’s impact did not end in 1995,” Brakic said. “It lives in the systematic discrimination against Bosniaks and the constant denial of our suffering.”
Ahmer Khan, the Muslim Community Liaison Advisor for the City of London, warned of the increase in reactionary right-wing content around the globe that has reinvigorated Serbian ethnonationalism, threatening to spill over into anti-Bosniak violence once again. “The rhetoric against the Bosnian people in Serbia is rising as we speak. There is a far right sentiment that is growing. It is very nationalistic. It is very dangerously close to hate speech. And we see this south of the border, we see this in Germany, but we also see this in Serbia.”
Closer to home, discrimination against Bosniaks has even found its way into the culture of far-right groups in Canada through the increasing popularity of Serbian ultra-nationalist and anti-Bosniak anthems.
Khan affirmed that openly remembering and discussing events like Srebrenica was key to combatting this threat. “It is extremely important that we are here today, and that we tell everyone that we were here today.”
Looking to the future
When asked about the future of the memorial day in London and the broader effort towards awareness of the Bosnian genocide, Ramić was adamant. “Of course we’re going to try to make it bigger,” he said, expressing his hopes for greater turnout and cross-community relationships.
Although this year’s ceremony was pulled together in a matter of weeks, Ramić is already looking ahead to 2026. He is hoping to start planning for next year’s event a few months earlier to ensure it does not overlap with other Srebrenica commemorations in Ontario, especially the primary one in Windsor. In addition to the memorial held in Windsor’s Jackson Park on July 6, this year there was also a vigil for the martyrs in Toronto the day before the London event, as well as a commemorative bike ride in Toronto the following day. With more cities starting to host their own memorial events, Ramić is hopeful they can extend the acts of remembrance “from the Saturday to [the following] weekend, all that time.”
There are also desires for more mutual support between the various London communities impacted by recent and ongoing humanitarian crises, including those in Palestine, Sudan, Iran, and Ukraine. Brakic, who participated in last summer’s Gaza solidarity encampment at Western University, explained why building solidarity was crucial in her speech at London’s first Srebrenica genocide commemoration, held shortly after the encampment ended in July of 2024.
“These shared histories of oppression and resilience forge a bond between us, compelling us to support one another in our struggles for justice,” she said. “It is our moral duty to raise our voices and stand up for Palestine, just as we wish the world had done for us. We must not remain silent in the face of injustice.”
“Our solidarity can make a difference, and our collective action can contribute to the global fight against oppression, and make sure this really never happens again,” she continued.
For her part, Jedina Brakic, Elma’s mother, sees great hope and promise in the work of her daughter and other young members of the Bosnian community, the next generation to carry the torch of Srebrenica’s memory.
“This young generation is starting to wake up — that’s something awesome” she said, beaming with admiration. “I’m really, really proud of them.”
