DODIK: SREBRENICA AND SURROUNDING VILLAGES ARE A PLACE OF SERBIAN SUFFERING, BUT ALSO PRIDE

BANJA LUKA, MAY 31 /SRNA/ - The Serbian people in Podrinje have experienced unprecedented suffering throughout history, but have never agreed, even at the cost of death, to renounce their identity and their faith, which were the sole reasons for their suffering in the crimes committed by the Ustasha in the Second World War and their descendants in the past civil war in BiH, stated President Milorad Dodik to SRNA.

On the occasion of the 83rd anniversary of the crimes against Serbs in Srebrenica and the surrounding villages on Trinity Sunday in 1943, Dodik emphasized to SRNA that the history of the Serbian people is written in the blood of innocent victims who were killed simply because they were Serbs, and that Srebrenica and the surrounding villages remain among the eternal witnesses of that suffering.

"On the great Orthodox holiday of Trinity Sunday in 1943, more than 250 men, women, children, and the elderly were killed in one of the numerous crimes by which the NDH /Independent State of Croatia/ tried to erase the Serbian name from these areas. This was not a 'conflict between two opposing armies,' nor a 'tragedy of war,' but a planned crime against innocent Serbian civilians, driven by hatred and the ideology of exterminating everything Serbian in those areas," Dodik pointed out.

He said that 250 innocent Serbian souls, heads of households, mothers, the elderly, and children, were brutally murdered only because they preserved their name, their patron saint's day, and the Orthodox faith.

"That was their only sin for the Ustasha executioners, their former neighbors until yesterday, who thought that with a dagger they would exterminate the Serbian root and existence in these areas. However, they were mistaken; they can extinguish earthly life, but the soul of a nation that remembers and does not forget cannot be killed. Every such victim today is our eternal debt and a beacon that reminds us never to forget who we are, where we come from, and the price we paid for freedom and survival on our own hearths," emphasized Dodik.

He said that the crimes the Ustasha began in 1943, their descendants intended to finish in the 1990s, all with one goal - to completely destroy and exterminate a nation, their existence, and to carry out ethnic cleansing.

"Religious holidays are days of Serbian suffering, and precisely on the days of family gatherings at the slava table, all the cruelty of the criminals came to the fore. Nothing was sacred to them, not the slava candle, nor the slava bread; they only saw blood and the murders of the weak, the elderly, women, and unarmed people. The most terrible chapters of Serbian history were written exactly on Trinity Sunday, St. Peter's Day, St. Elijah's Day, St. Nicholas' Day, Christmas... both in the Second World War and in the last Defense-Patriotic War," Dodik reminded.

Dodik pointed out that Srebrenica and the surrounding villages are not just a place of one instance of suffering and one dark time, but a place of Serbian suffering that was silenced and suppressed for decades, but also a place of Serbian pride.

And about this crime against Serbian civilians in 1943, he added, the communist authorities remained silent, or even worse - lied and falsified history, presenting the Serbian victims as, as they used to say, members of the anti-fascist resistance, without stating their nationality. He emphasized that this was one in a series of attempts to belittle the Serbian people and hide their sacrifice.

"Serbian victims deserve the same respect as all others, piety, and truth, without selective memory and political calculations. That is why today, when we remember the Srebrenica martyrs, we have an obligation to speak the truth loudly and without fear. The pain of other mothers, fathers, and sisters is no greater than the pain of a Serbian mother, father, or sister. It is our duty to preserve the memory of the innocently slain, so that their names do not fall into oblivion and serve as a warning to generations to come about the evil that wanted to destroy our entire people," Dodik pointed out.

He emphasized that Republika Srpska was also created as a vow that the pits, massacres, execution sites, attempts at extermination, and refugee columns would never again happen to the Serbian people.

"Republika Srpska is our home, and its institutions are our security. That is why we will always stand by the truth, by the memory of our ancestors, and by the right of the Serbian people to live freely and with dignity on their centuries-old hearths," stated Dodik.