The founder of the War Childhood Museum, Jasminko Halilovic, said that the number of 1.601 children killed in besieged Sarajevo has no confirmation and that this number can always be supplemented with a new name because there are deaths that have not been recorded.
Halilovic wrote on his Facebook that, above all, the number of children killed in besieged Sarajevo is a painful and difficult topic and that he researched it exactly ten years ago.
He adds that during that research, he realized that there is absolutely no confirmation for the number of 1.601 children killed in besieged Sarajevo.
”Exactly ten years ago, back in 2012, I published the text ‘Actual number of children killed’ on Radio Sarajevo, because during the research for the book ‘Djetinjstvo u ratu: Sarajevo 1992-1995’ (War Childhood: Sarajevo 1992–1995) I realized that there is absolutely no confirmation for the number 1.601. I think it was the first time that someone spoke publicly about it. At that time, I was attacked by historians on duty and experts (forerunners of today’s party bots) that this is not something I should deal with,” Halilovic wrote.
Halilovic also says that the text has disappeared in the meantime, but also that the only one who praised it in general for initiating that topic, in addition to a series of condemnatory comments, was the deceased Jovan Divjak.
”He cared about finding out the truth. But unfortunately, for those who ruled Sarajevo after the war, establishing the truth and facts was not important. It was important to spread this number, both to the media and politicians, to take pictures with flowers on anniversaries, to collect cheap points by manipulating what hurts people the most,” he further writes.
”In my opinion, and as other mass crimes show, it is unrealistic to expect the exact number of people/children killed during the siege of Sarajevo to be determined. That number can always be supplemented with a new name and new information. There are dead who left no one behind, whose death almost no one recorded. But that doesn’t mean that number can deviate by hundreds. There should be a number of ‘hitherto precisely determined victims’, which implies that it can be higher, but it can never be lower,” he added.
It should be reminded that the topic of the number of children killed during the siege of Sarajevo was raised by political analyst and psychologist Srdjan Puhalo, who called on the authorities to either prove that 1.601 children were killed in Sarajevo or to stop using that number. He was also supported by the Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) director Jasmila Zbanic, Klix.ba writes.
E.Dz.
