SERBIAN NATIONAL SHIELD SOCIETY OF CANADA & GLAS KANADSKIH SRBA/VOICE OF
CANADIAN SERBS
November 29, 2004
Hemispheres
CBC Television
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
This weekend your Hemispheres program "Living with the killers" repeated the
same one-sided story about Serbian atrocities in Bosnia with no coverage of
the atrocities perpetrated by the Bosnian Muslims against the Bosnian Serb
population, as though the Serbs suffered no losses, as though Serbian
mothers are not crying for lost sons and husbands. It appears sensitivity
and objectivity is applied to all groups from war zones, except the Serbs.
Some of your omissions which would have made a balanced report are below:
1) In 1992, before the Srebrenica tragedy, the New York Times brought
an
explicit photo and article of the expulsion of Serbs from Srebrenica.
2) The Srebrenica tragedy occurred after more than a year of commando
raids
and killings of Serbs by Nasir Oric and his Muslim gangs who ventured from
that 'militarized safe haven' used as a staging area to attack nearby
Serbian villages, burn homes and kill hundreds of Serbs. Oric even invited
the Western media to show off his war trophies - videos of Serbian heads!
Bill Schiller describes this in the Toronto Star, July 16, 1995. Your report
makes it appear that the Serbs were only initiating, and not reacting to,
attacks against them from inside a 'safe haven'. The killings at Srebrenica,
reaction to the murderous operations and provocations of Oric and company,
are not viewed as 'revenge', but as genocide. The omission of Oric's
murderous actions makes the argument of genocide believable to the
uninformed. The Bosnian Serbs are also "living with killers" - Oric, one of
the primary killers and ringleaders still "living with" the Serbs, has not
been brought to justice.
3) The Red Cross (ICRC report #37 of Sept. 13, 1995) states that 5000
Srebrenica Muslim troops left the enclave prior to its fall and
Izetbegovic's government admitted that these men were reassigned elsewhere.
They were then listed as missing. Michael Evans and Michael Kallenbach write
in the Times (1995) 'Thousands of missing Bosnian Muslim soldiers from
Srebrenica… are believed to be safe in the northeast of Tuzla". So what were
Muslim soldiers doing in a supposedly demilitarized 'safe haven'?
4) Ibran Mustafic, a representative in the Bosnian parliament, said in
an
interview Aug. 15, 1996 said that the betrayal of Srebrenica "was
consciously prepared and that the Bosnian president and the army command
were involved in this business" and that was to sacrifice Srebrenica in
order to gain the sympathy of the West.
5) The spark which ignited the Bosnia war in April 1992 was the killing
of a
Serbian wedding party by Bosnian Muslims. But the media chose a pro-Muslim
line and the anti-Serbian reporting, tantamount to propaganda, has not
ceased to this day.
6) The war in Bosnia-Hercegovina was a civil war among three groups:
Serbs,
Croats and Muslims. All were affected, but you omit the crimes committed by
the other two groups. Alija Izetbegovic, Franjo Tudjman and Radovan Karadzic
were the leaders during the civil war, yet the world did not seek to try the
Muslim and Croat leaders, now deceased, only the Serbian one.
7) You have not highlighted the criminal actions sanctioned by Tudjman
and
Izetbegovic (including the importation of Muslim mujahedins affiliated with
Al-Qaida). America is now hunting those Muslim militants in Bosnia. The
massive support Bosnian Muslims received from Saudi Arabia was not delivered
in the name of multiethnicity!
8) In both world wars the Serbs were on the side of the Allies (Canada
and
the US) while the Croats and Bosnian Muslims were on the side of
Austro-Hungary and Hitler. You also omit the crimes committed against
hundreds of thousands of Serbs of Bosnia and Croatia by the many Bosnian
Muslims who were in Hitler's SS divisions or by the Croatian Nazi Ustashi
whose crimes against the Serbs even revolted the German Nazis. The first
ethnic cleansing occurred in the WWII Croatian Nazi state (which included
Bosnia-Hercegovina) which passed a law to kill one third of the Serbs, expel
one third and forcibly convert one third.
What about the stories about: almost 1 million permanent Serbian
refugees (UNHCR figures) from Bosnia and Croatia living in camps inside
Serbia; or the August 1995 weekend expulsion of the entire Serbian
population from Krajina in Croatia with the help of the US; or the 250,000+
Serbs permanently driven out of Kosovo by Albanians after the NATO bombing;
or the missing Serbian children of Kosovo; or the use of depleted uranium
bombs dropped by NATO on Serbian soil; or the terrible March pogrom of the
Albanians against Kosovo Serbs and the destruction of some 150 ancient
Serbian churches and monasteries in Kosovo? Are these stories not worthy of
your time and consideration?
As Canadians of Serbian heritage we feel your report is biased and
totally one-sided. For the sake of journalistic objectivity and
responsibility to your Canadian viewers and the historical record, it would
only be correct and fair to broadcast the other side of the story too, such
as the documentary "Yugoslavia: The Avoidable War" which aired on the
History Channel (Alliance Atlantis) a few years ago.
I would appreciate your reply to the above comments and suggestions.
Yours truly,
Bora Dragasevich, President
E-mail: glaskanadskihsrba@
Serbian News Network - SNN
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.antic.org/
