“”But very few non-Serb areas became Serb and certainly no large parts of Bosnia.”"”

Are you crazy? It is a well known fact that practically all of eastern Bosnia along the Drina was inhabited by a Muslim majority. Hasan Prishtina’s comment on this is quite clear, anyone interested can find maps and data that confirm this.

Once again, the words ‘genocidal scum’ are yours, not mine.

I’m not going to waste my time explaining you the legal and moral arguments against the application of the right to self-determination to the Serb entity of Bosnia, because you are not a person who argue in good faith. You systematically try to distort my arguments and insinuate that I am making claims that I don’t make.

Branka Sudic:

I invoke the concept of political responsibility of the members of a community towards its historical legacy. Responsibility and guilt are different concepts, both in political thought and as juridical principles.

People like you and many others have also been victims of this war, like the inhabitants of Serb-held areas of Sarajevo who found themselves living in Srebrenica, a place that meant nothing to them and where they were forced to live with the legacy of a crime they didn’t commit.

But it is important to bear in mind who started it, who was fighting for what and how it was carried out.

I quote Plavsic saying that she would have no problem in accepting the death of 6 million Serbs. The Serbian nationalists who planned and carried out this was never, for a single moment had any respect for the lives and well being of any Serbs other than themselves. Feeding their wealth and their obsession for the purity of the Nation was all that mattered.

It is not by chance that, ever since the beginning, it was extremely difficult to recruit the conscripts for the army and that the army of RS had a cronical shortage of man power, while in Serbia, men in military age who were born in Bosnia were chased around and forced to go to war.

However, we must not forget that there was, nonetheless, a very wide participation in crimes. People like the Lukic cousins, who terrorised Visegrad, and so many others, many small town petty tyrants.

This brings me back to the issue of responsibility. I believe that real change in Bosnia must come from normal people, those like you who don’t like to be divided by the flawed criteria of nationality. I have found the same frustration that you express many times.

Here I use the term responsibility as duty, not merely towards the past, also towards the future. It is quite obvious that we cannot expect much from the ruling elite.

I am an ethnic Serb living within the borders of the RS and I would much rather live in a mixed and co-operative Bosnia which is more like the Sarajevo where I was born than the backward and ethnographic defined state where I am forced to exist now.

Why are you saying that I should be held collectively responsible with those old men (and women) who led us into the stupid wars of the nineties, for wanting “self-determination” when in fact that is the last thing I want.

Why are you unable to see beyond people as racial groupings?

Yes. And I hope you all succeed. But it is not likely is it?

“Serbs were not a majority on the territory of what is now ‘Republika Srpska’.”

Really? Sources? I have just gone over to have a look at the nice map they have showing the pre-war distribution of population and to me it looks as if the war did not change the distribution of population as a whole, but rather concentrated it. That is, non-Serbs were driven out of Serb majority areas and Serbs out of non-Serb areas. But very few non-Serb areas became Serb and certainly no large parts of Bosnia.

“They are now thanks to mass expulsion of the non-Serb population, plus the relocation of Serbs from other regions of Bosnia, most of which were forced to leave their homes by the Serb nationalists themselves, who, behaving as if people were property, would not allow their ’subjects’ to live in areas under control of Bosniaks and Croats. This is a proven fact.”

Yes. It is well known that the Serbs of Croatia did not flee when the Croat Army was approaching and occupying their villages. Come on, this is childish. People flee for one reason and it usually involves young armed men with a tendency to rape and murder. In Croatia as in Bosnia.

“Thus the idea of self-determination cannot apply to this region, because that would be rewarding genocide, to put it in a simple way and not waste time with juridical and moral arguments.”

Which is simply the exact same argument the Serbs make when they say they cannot allow self determination because it would be rewarding collaboration with the Turks. The people of RS did not commit genocide, individuals did. They belong in jail and the people of RS have every right to exercise self determination.

“A quick return of the refugees, as happened in Kosovo, would have been the best thing, but until a certain point conditions on the ground did not allow it, and we cannot criticize people who have suffered so much, and who, meanwhile, organized their lives again, not to want to return.”

So that would be rewarding Croat ethnic cleansing would it?

“What you suggest the bosnian Serbs to do is the same thing that Biljana Plavsic did to get away with genocide. Bravo! This tells a lot about your political and moral values.”

I am suggesting guilt is not collective. The people of RS cannot be punished indefinitely while the Croats and Kosovars are rewarded just because we don’t like their political leaders.

And by the way, by saying that the Serbs of Bosnia cannot be allowed to exercise their right to self determination because this would be rewarding genocide what do you mean except that they are all genocidal scum? How is the genocide the fault of all Serbs?

I think Sarah has covered this quite well. Until the war, Eastern Bosnia had a predominently Muslim population, though Serbs were in the majority around Banja Luka. Predominently Serb areas were to be found in Eastern Hercegovina and around Drvar. This changed when the VJ and its allies moved in to towns like Višegrad in the first month of the war.

Murderers are responsible for their murders, not the communities they come from.

RS is still governed by the successors of the SDS, the government that carried out the murders in the first place. There is a world away from Germany in 1949. Germany had lost territory, not gained it. FRG’s civil service and political representatives were not, by and large, ex-Nazis. Furthermore, Germany admitted all its part in the war, including starting it. We are a very long way from that with RS. And surely the views of the people of RS are reflected by their elected representatives?

And it’s not a matter of failing to speak up for the Kosovars. It’s a matter of demanding for oneself what one wants to prevent others having, and being prepared to kill to prevent them having it.

Given that the peoples of Yugoslavia cannot live together in Yugoslavia, they are unlikely to do so in Bosnia or in Kosovo.

They were unable to live together in Yugoslavia because it suited a number of politicians, among whom Milosevic and Tudjman, to have them believe that there was no alternative to ethnonationalism and violence. As far as Kosova is concerned, south of Mitrovica there is a net inflow of Serbs returning from Serbia and taking up citizenship in Kosova. To the north, Belgrade pays double salaries to all its employees (which is most of the population who have jobs) and encourages nationalist extremists to expel Albanians and bully moderate Serbs into submission. Where did we see this before?

I take great satisfaction that an excuser of fascism has to lie about what I have said in order to put a point across and invite anyone to go to the “Karadzic trial” thread to see for themselves just what I did say and what a dishonest representation of that which SMFS is trying desperately to suggest.

Serbs were not a majority on the territory of what is now ‘Republika Srpska’.
They are now thanks to mass expulsion of the non-Serb population, plus the relocation of Serbs from other regions of Bosnia, most of which were forced to leave their homes by the Serb nationalists themselves, who, behaving as if people were property, would not allow their ’subjects’ to live in areas under control of Bosniaks and Croats. This is a proven fact. Thus the idea of self-determination cannot apply to this region, because that would be rewarding genocide, to put it in a simple way and not waste time with juridical and moral arguments. A quick return of the refugees, as happened in Kosovo, would have been the best thing, but until a certain point conditions on the ground did not allow it, and we cannot criticize people who have suffered so much, and who, meanwhile, organized their lives again, not to want to return.

Bosnia will never be the same, but this doesn’t mean it’s condemned to disappear.

So much for subtlety:

In what regards the difference between collective guilt and political responsibility, as well as legitimacy, I use the concepts as defined by Hannah Arendt. She has very clearly defined the difference between guilt and responsibility.

“”"But suppose the Bosnian Serbs make a break with their past. They apologise. They purge and try those responsible for the past. And then they decide they want to leave Bosnia and join Serbia. Can anyone think of a logical reason why they can’t?”"”

What you suggest the bosnian Serbs to do is the same thing that Biljana Plavsic did to get away with genocide. Bravo! This tells a lot about your political and moral values.

Furthermore, never ever in my life I have said or even though that

“”"Serbs are all genocidal scum who got what is coming to them”"”

I challenge you to search my blog and find anything showing even remotely resemblance to such a phrase, that is yours, not mine.