Sarajevo honors 10 Srebrenica victims ahead of July burial

Thousands of Sarajevo residents joined state officials and diplomats on Thursday to honor the remains of 10 Srebrenica genocide victims during an emotional farewell ceremony in the capital, as the coffins began their final journey toward the Potocari Memorial Cemetery ahead of the 31st anniversary burial. The victims, killed by Bosnian Serb forces under convicted war criminal Ratko Mladic in July 1995, were identified through DNA analysis and will be interred on July 11 alongside thousands of previously buried victims of the massacre, according to Anadolu Agency.

Journey through the capital

The funeral convoy departed from Visoko in central Bosnia on Thursday morning and traveled through Sarajevo's Marshal Tito and Mula Mustafe Baseskija streets under police escort. In keeping with tradition, the procession paused before the Bosnia and Herzegovina Presidency building, where officials and citizens laid flowers on the vehicles and offered prayers for the dead.

Turkish Ambassador to Bosnia and Herzegovina Emin Akseki joined relatives of the victims and numerous citizens at the ceremony, where some mourners were seen weeping as the coffins passed. Before leaving the capital, the convoy also stopped at the Children Killed During the Siege of Sarajevo Memorial and the Markale marketplace — the site of two major massacres during the 1992-1995 Bosnian War.

Burial at Potocari

The remains are expected to arrive in Potocari on Thursday evening and will be kept overnight in the former battery factory that once housed Dutch UN peacekeepers during the conflict. Funeral prayers for the 10 victims will take place on July 11 during ceremonies commemorating the 31st anniversary of the genocide, when they will join more than 6,700 previously buried victims at the memorial cemetery.

Among those to be interred this year are Senad Jusic, who was 20 when killed, and Ramo Dautovic, who was 56. The full list of victims being buried includes Muriz Barakovic, Hamed Music, Ramo Alic, Muhidin Osmanovic, Huso Cerimovic, Nuko Nukic, Ahmet Guster, and Asim Kunic.

Historical context

On July 11, 1995, Bosnian Serb forces under Mladic's command overran Srebrenica, a UN-protected safe area, and executed at least 8,372 Bosniak men and boys after separating them from women and children who were bussed to safety. The International Court of Justice recognized the killings as genocide in 2007, while the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia gathered evidence from mass graves where victims were buried before later exhumation.

Since the war, remains recovered from 150 locations including 77 mass graves have been identified through DNA analysis and returned to families for burial at Potocari. More than 1,000 victims remain missing, while 6,772 have been buried at the memorial cemetery and 250 others in local cemeteries at family request.