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SARAJEVO: Three decades after the Srebrenica genocide, relatives are still looking for and burying the remains of more than 8,000 men and boys killed by Bosnian Serb forces, revealing the painful scars cut deep into the country.
On July 11, 1995, Bosnian Serb forces stormed the Muslim enclave of more than 40,000 people in eastern Bosnia.
At the time, it was a “UN protected zone” — an ultimately hollow phrase meant to shield the many displaced people who had fled the 1992-1995 war.
General Ratko Mladic’s forces executed thousands of men and boys before burying them in mass graves.

After decades of painstaking work, about 7,000 victims have been identified and properly buried, but about 1,000 remain missing.
Mass grave discoveries are now rare. The last was uncovered in 2021, when the remains of 10 victims were exhumed 180 kilometers (112 miles) southwest of Srebrenica.
This year, the remains of seven victims will be buried during the July 11 commemorations at the Srebrenica-Potocari Memorial Center, including two 19-year-old men and a 67-year-old woman.

“This year, I’m having my father buried. But only one bone, his lower jaw,” Mirzeta Karic told AFP.
The 50-year-old said her mother was very ill, and so she decided to go ahead with the burial without waiting for more remains to be found.
Her father, Sejdalija Alic, joined several thousand men and teenagers who tried to flee Mladic’s troops through the dense forests.
He failed.
His 22-year-old son, Sejdin, was also killed, as were Alic’s three brothers and their four sons.
He will be Karic’s 50th immediate family member laid to rest at Potocari cemetery.
The ceremony for her brother, Sejdin, was in 2003.
“I’ve been able to endure everything, but I think this funeral will be the worst. We’re having a bone buried. I can’t describe the pain.”
An international criminal court sentenced Mladic, now 83, and former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, now 80, to life jail terms for war crimes and genocide during the conflict that left nearly 100,000 dead. Both are still incarcerated, but a proper reckoning inside the splintered Bosnian states remains overdue.
Political leaders in the Bosnian Serb entity, Republika Srpska, reject the term genocide and regularly downplay the massacre.
“This denial is trivialized,” Neira Sabanovic, a researcher at the Universite Libre de Bruxelles, said.
“It is very rare to find someone in Republika Srpska who acknowledges that there was genocide,” she said.
Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik remains one of the most heard voices of genocide-denial in the statelet and Serbia.
Of 305 instances of denial or downplaying in Serbian and the Bosnian Serb media during 2024, he leads the way, appearing 42 times, according to an annual study published by the Srebrenica Memorial Center.
Last year, an international day of remembrance was established by the United Nations to mark the Srebrenica genocide, despite protests from Belgrade and Republika Srpska.
On Saturday, political leaders from the Bosnian Serb entity and Serbia, along with dignitaries from the Serbian Orthodox Church, will gather in Bratunac, near Srebrenica, for a commemoration of more than 3,200 eastern Bosnian Serb soldiers and civilians killed during the war.
Portraits of some 600 of these dead were hung along the road this week near the Srebrenica Memorial Center.
“These people are not participating in the same debate. They are having a conversation with themselves, and they are still in 1995,” the director of the Srebrenica Memorial Center, Emir Suljagic, told local television on Thursday.
“We have won a very important battle, the battle for international recognition,” he added, referring to the UN resolution.

KERRVILLE, Texas: Rescuers scoured flooded riverbanks littered with mangled trees Saturday and turned over rocks in the search for more than two dozen children from a girls’ camp and many others missing after a wall of water blasted down a river in the Texas Hill Country. The storm killed at least 32 people, including 14 children.
The destructive fast-moving waters rose 26 feet (8 meters) in just 45 minutes before daybreak Friday, washing away homes and vehicles. The danger was not over as torrential rains continued pounding communities outside San Antonio on Saturday and flash flood warnings and watches remained in effect.
Searchers used helicopters, boats and drones to look for victims and to rescue stranded people in trees and from camps isolated by washed-out roads.
“We will not stop until we find everyone who is missing,” Nim Kidd, chief of Texas Department of Emergency Management, said at a press conference Saturday afternoon.
Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha said the bodies of 32 people had been recovered so far: 18 adults and 14 children.
Authorities were coming under growing scrutiny Saturday over whether the camps and residents in places long vulnerable to flooding received proper warning and whether enough preparations were made.
The hills along the Guadalupe River in central Texas are dotted with century-old youth camps and campgrounds where generations of families have come to swim and enjoy the outdoors. The area is especially popular around the July Fourth holiday, making it more difficult to know how many are missing.
“We don’t even want to begin to estimate at this time,” said City Manager Dalton Rice said on Saturday morning.
Raging storm hit camp in middle of the night
Some 27 children were among the missing from Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along the river, he said.
“The camp was completely destroyed,” said Elinor Lester, 13, one of hundreds of campers. “A helicopter landed and started taking people away. It was really scary.”
A raging storm fueled by incredible amounts of moisture woke up her cabin just after midnight Friday, and when rescuers arrived, they tied a rope for the girls to hold as they walked across a bridge with water whipping around their legs, she said.
Frantic parents and families posted photos of missing loved ones and pleas for information.
On Saturday, the camp was mostly deserted. Helicopters roared above as a few people looked at the damage, including a pickup truck tossed onto its side and a building missing its entire front wall.
Among those confirmed dead were an 8-year-old girl from Mountain Brook, Alabama, who was staying at Camp Mystic, and the director of another camp just up the road.
The flooding in the middle of the night caught many residents, campers and officials by surprise in the Hill Country, which sits northwest of San Antonio.
AccuWeather said the private forecasting company and the National Weather Service sent warnings about potential flash flooding hours before the devastation.
“These warnings should have provided officials with ample time to evacuate camps such as Camp Mystic and get people to safety,” AccuWeather said in a statement that called the Hill Country one of the most flash-flood-prone areas of the US because of its terrain and many water crossings.
Officials defended their actions while saying they had not expected such an intense downpour that was the equivalent of months’ worth of rain for the area.
One National Weather Service forecast earlier in the week “did not predict the amount of rain that we saw,” said Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management.
Helicopters, drones used in frantic search for missing
Search crews were facing harsh conditions while “looking in every possible location,” Rice said.
Authorities said about 850 people had been rescued. US Coast Guard helicopters were flying in to assist.
One reunification center at an elementary school was mostly quiet Saturday after taking in hundreds of evacuees the day before.
“We still have people coming here looking for their loved ones. We’ve had a little success, but not much,” said Bobby Templeton, superintendent of Ingram Independent School District.
President Donald Trump said Saturday that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was traveling to Texas and his administration was working with officials on the ground.
“Melania and I are praying for all of the families impacted by this horrible tragedy,” Trump said in a statement on his social media network.
Residents clung to trees, fled to attics
In Ingram, Erin Burgess woke to thunder and rain in the middle of the night Friday. Just 20 minutes later, water was pouring into her home, she said. She described an agonizing hour clinging to a tree with her teenage son.
“My son and I floated to a tree where we hung onto it, and my boyfriend and my dog floated away. He was lost for a while, but we found them,” she said.
Barry Adelman said water pushed everyone in his three-story house into the attic, including his 94-year-old grandmother and 9-year-old grandson.
“I was having to look at my grandson in the face and tell him everything was going to be OK, but inside I was scared to death,” he said.
Local resident know it as ” flash flood alley. ”
“When it rains, water doesn’t soak into the soil,” said Austin Dickson, CEO of the Community Foundation of the Texas Hill Country, which was collecting donations. “It rushes down the hill.”
‘No one knew this kind of flood was coming’
The forecast for the weekend had called for rain, with a flood watch upgraded to a warning overnight Friday for at least 30,000 people. Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said the potential for heavy rain and flooding covered a large area.
“Everything was done to give them a heads up that you could have heavy rain, and we’re not exactly sure where it’s going to land,” Patrick said. “Obviously as it got dark last night, we got into the wee morning of the hours, that’s when the storm started to zero in.”
Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly, the county’s chief elected official, said: “We do not have a warning system.”
When pushed on why more precautions weren’t taken, Kelly said no one knew this kind of flood was coming.
More pockets of heavy rains expected
The slow-moving storm is bringing more rain Saturday, with the potential for pockets of heavy downpours and more flooding, said Jason Runyen, of the National Weather Service.
The threat could linger overnight and into Sunday morning, he said.