Displaced Bosnian Roma apply to return to their homes in Srebrenica

05 December 2000

The Sarajevo-based Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina reported on October 15, 2000, that sixty Romani families from Srebrenica, in the eastern part of the Republika Srpska entity of Bosnia and Herzegovina, had voluntarily registered with local authorities to return to their pre-war homes from Sarajevo, where they are currently accommodated. According to the Helsinki Committee, only two of the houses owned by the Roma in Srebrenica were destroyed in the war; the other 58 families may be able to move back into their pre-war homes. On December 12, the Helsinki Committee reported that the return was still planned, but had not yet taken place due to the municipal elections of November 11 and the resulting ongoing change of local government. According to UNHCR as of December 13, no displaced Roma had returned to Srebrenica. Srebrenica achieved notoriety in July 1995, when Bosnian Serb forces occupied this United Nations-protected enclave, expelled the entire non-Serbian population, and killed thousands of Bosnian Muslim men during the siege. The Srebrenica Roma are predominantly Muslim. Muslim Roma were targeted by Serb paramilitaries and the Serb-dominated Yugoslav national army for genocidal attacks along with the rest of the Bosnian Muslim population during the Bosnian war in 1993. Non-Muslim Roma also fell victim of abuse.

(Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina, UNHCR)