This week was a sad week for many as we commemorated the atrocities that tore London apart in 2005. The country fell silent at 11:30am on 7th July as we remembered the 52 people killed by terrorist attacks on London’s transport network ten years ago.
Yet relatively few people knew that this week also commemorates an attack on a much larger scale that occurred in Europe in 1995. An EU resolution in 2009 made it official that 11th July was to be an international day of remembrance for the 8,732 Muslim men and boys were killed in Srebrenica, Bosnia, as part of a genocide that saw Europe recreate the death marches, camps and mass graves of the Holocaust, 45 years later.
A moving ceremony was held on 6th July in Westminster Abbey, organised by Remembering Srebrenica, for which JVN provided a team of eight volunteers. The team was led by JVN President Rosalind Preston OBE, who said she “was deeply moved and filled with pity for those who still carry the scars” of the massacre 20 years ago. Over 2,000 guests including survivors, politicians and advocates of interfaith collaboration were in attendance, which preceded a reception at 10 Downing Street, hosted by Prime Minister David Cameron.
Leonie Lewis, JVN Director, also attended the reception, having been involved in Remembering Srebrenica and the organisation of the commemoration in the UK. She visited Srebrenica with a delegation from the charity, where she witnessed first-hand “what happens when hate rules.” She wrote in a book to honour the victims, “We have to own the narrative of Srebrenica as Europeans. We [as members of other faiths] have to help the Muslim community to own the narrative, and to help commemorate it in a way that has meaning.”
The volunteers at the event were praised by Remembering Srebrenica President Colonel Bob Stewart MP (pictured above speaking at the event and right with Leonie) as a “valuable asset in making the commemoration at Westminster such a success.”
