LINTA: THOSE WHO BRAZENLY LIE ABOUT SERBS FORGET THEY ETHNICALLY CLEANSED FBiH

BELGRADE, OCTOBER 20 /SRNA/ – Miodrag Linta, Chair of the Association of Serbs from the Region, says it is scandalous and shameless that Bosniak chauvinists and extremists persistently repeat the most brazen lies about the Serb people while forgetting that they themselves ethnically cleansed Sarajevo, operated an extensive network of prison camps for Serbs, yet to be held accountable for or confront their crimes.

Linta told SRNA that the defacement of a mural depicting the Serb tricolour in Istočno Novo Sarajevo with the offensive inscription "genocidal" was a provocation reflecting the policy of a large part of Sarajevo-based political parties, which narrows down to false narrative and the spread of intense hatred and intolerance towards Serbs.

"It is important to emphasise that the facts themselves best refute the lie portraying Serbs as aggressors, those responsible for the war in BiH, and `genocidal`. These facts include that around 500,000 Serbs were expelled from the entire territory of the FBiH, including more than 150,000 from the Sarajevo area alone. There were more than 120 prison camps and prisons in areas of Sarajevo under Muslim control where Serbs were brutally tortured, many of whom were killed," Linta stressed.

He points out that no one has been held accountable for these crimes and mass execution sites, such as Kazani, arguing that this also demonstrates the absence of an "independent" judiciary in BiH.

"We have an ethnically motivated judiciary serving Bosniak political interests, with the aim of validating this false myth of Serbs as aggressors, criminals and `genocidal,` while portraying Bosniaks exclusively as victims and as a people who supposedly defended themselves against `Greater Serbian aggression,`" Linta said.

Therefore, Linta says, it is essential to keep fighting for the truth about the nature of the war and to reiterate that the main responsibility for the war lay with the extremist policies of Alija Izetbegović and the Party of Democratic Action /SDA/, that crimes had been committed and people had suffered on all sides in BiH, but that it is unacceptable to blame a single people who had been defending themselves for the entire tragedy.

"Serbs were forced to take up arms and defend themselves to prevent a repeat of 1941," Linta noted.

He says he strongly welcomes the activities of the Republika Srpska Memorial Centre, particularly its work over recent months in the US Congress in Washington, as well as in New York and Rome, where it has presented the truth of the suffering of Serbs.

"I believe this is the way we should fight for the truth about the suffering of our compatriots, preserve the culture of remembrance and inform the international public about these facts," Linta stressed.