In the town of Vecici near Kotor Varos, a collective funeral was held yesterday for eight people whose remains were found in the two mass graves of Plitska and Duboki Potok, and none of the eight coffins had a complete skeleton.
This is the first collective funeral in the last 15 years in the area of Kotor Varos, where several hundred Bosniak civilians were killed during the war, more precisely in 1992, and the youngest victim is Mirnesa Beculic, who was killed when she was only one month and six days old.
Eight people found peace yesterday, and not a single coffin contained a complete skeleton. Munever Alagic found a part of his father’s thigh in a mass grave 12 years ago. For twelve years, he waited for more parts of the skeleton, but nothing more was found. This year, he will bury only that one bone.
”Today I am burying my father, that is, only a part of the thigh bone was found, about 10 centimeters and that’s all. A long period has passed, and all these years we hoped to find at least one more part of the skeleton. More than 12 years have passed since the discovery of the mass grave, and we decided to at least bury this one so that we would have a place to recite El-Fatiha,”Alagic said yesterday.
He added that his grandfather also died while fleeing through the woods with 175 people who are missing.
”The soul is much calmer. We hope that the rest of the skeleton will be found someday,” Alagic concluded.
34-year-old Emir Alagic also buried his father yesterday, who was killed 30 years ago. He hardly remembers anything, not even the face of his father, and yesterday was one of his happiest days in the last 30 years because his father will find peace.
”We have been waiting for thirty years to have a grave where we can recite El-Fatiha. None of this group has a complete skeleton, it has a larger part of the skeleton, a year and a half ago we saw a skeleton in Visoko, and his remains were found in the Duboki Potok mass grave. I often think about him based on stories, I imagine his character. Everyone is crying a lot, and relatives are crying, but I actually look forward to this day. Thank God that it came and that we will have a place to come and visit the grave,”Alagic said.
Amrudin Alagic has been searching for his father and other family members for 30 years, and he disappeared in the town of Grabovica on November 3rd with about 160 other people.
”Their remains were probably transferred from Grabovica to secondary and tertiary graves. The man lives and hopes. I hope that the bones will be found and that they will have their own peace. In addition to murder and hiding, their silence hurts the most,” he stated.
Yesterday’s funeral was led by Reis-ul-ulema Husein ef. Kavazovic, and the film ”145 days of crime, 30 years of waiting”will be shown, which shows the confessions of those events that were recorded in the area of Kotor Varos, where civilians were killed in the most brutal ways, Klix.ba reports.
E.Dz.
