On February 5 of this year, activists of the YIHR organized a street action in Belgrade, where they informed citizens about the established facts regarding the crimes at Markale. During and after the action, citizens signed the letter with messages of solidarity and compassion for the families of the victims.
With this act, together with the citizens of Serbia, young people sent a message that there are those who remember and who want a future in which peace has no alternative. By symbolically delivering the letter, we aim to create new spaces for remembrance, empathy, and respect, with the goal that crimes from the past are never repeated – especially not in our name. The Siege of Sarajevo was the longest siege of a
city in modern history. Exclusive narratives and denial of the past still divide people, which is why the mission of the YIHR is to continue building connections where they do not exist, based on principles of truth, responsibility, and empathy.
The meeting with the Deputy Mayor of Sarajevo is part of the study trip “Paths of the Nineties,” in which young people from Serbia, Croatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina learn about the wartime past through a series of lectures, discussions, and visits to museums such as the War Childhood Museum and sites of civilian suffering, including locations of crimes such as the former Vase Miskina Street, Markale market, the City Hall, Kazani, Vitez, Ahmići, and Trusina. The study trip program is implemented by the Youth Initiatives for Human Rights in Croatia and Serbia, with the support of the Sarajevo office of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation.
Good neighborly relations in post-conflict societies are not built on minimizing or relativizing the suffering of others or denying crimes. Despite declarative messages from officials in Serbia expressing a desire for good neighborly relations with Bosnia and Herzegovina, the crimes at Markale were denied at least 48 times on television channels with national frequency in Serbia during 2025.
Starting tomorrow, April 8, the City of Sarajevo will include the letter of solidarity from citizens of Serbia as an integral part of the exhibition “The Hague Legacy Through Judgments,” which can be visited at the City Hall in Sarajevo.
