Fadila Efendiq, after 29 years, still experiences deep pain for the loss of her son, husband and over 25 family members. Her life and that of other mothers is suffering, tears and unhealed wounds.
29 years after the most tragic event that has affected the old continent since the Second World War, he speaks quietly, but, due to poor health, today, on this anniversary, I will not go out, not even in the commemorations.
Fadila Efendiq is the mother of one of the over 8,000 victims of the genocide in Srebrenica.
In addition to the son, his husband and over 25 other family members were also killed. During each visit to the cemetery, he says a prayer for each one, says that he underlines the names, so that I don’t forget anyone.
“In the Srebrenica Genocide, my only son and my husband were killed on the same day. The boy was a student of the second year of the electrical engineering school. The deceased man was among the first to be buried, on March 31, 2003. There were serious thoughts about where they are, what happened? Each corpse has its own stamp of suffering and pain. Since the month of May, we have been preparing to wait to bury our loved ones, our martyrs, so that there will be a sign from them”, Efendiq told Radio Dukagjinin.
The man’s remains were returned to him. He took only two leg bones from the boy.
“The man’s body was returned whole, while only two bones of the boy’s legs were found. In 2008, the institute told me that there is something, but the excavations cannot be done, but in 2013, I buried those bones next to his father, so that there is a trace. When I come to the cemetery, I look at these signs and pray, I feel as if I have talked with them. It is much easier to bury them than to live in uncertainty”, she continued.
For him, Srebrenica is a ghost town. In the town he calls a ghost, he lives alone.
In the terror he experienced, and which still haunts him like a ghost from the past, he finds solace in the girl’s family. He has 3 grandchildren for reasons of living.
Efendi says that I will not forget or forgive this crime.
“I ask, why, for what, what are the major interests for an entire nation to be destroyed. Our Srebrenica is now a ghost. The city is not the buildings, nor the roads, nor the asphalt. The city is the people. Assesi, assesi I can’t forget. I can’t forgive until I’m alive. They destroyed the life, they destroyed the mind, if you are a Muslim you cannot be alive, much less wise”.
“The boy was taken from the Dutch camp. His name was Fejzo, he knew English, he was invited to translate and see the possibility of being rescued and taken out to the liberated territory. But all the men from the camp in Potoçare were killed. This is due to the fact that they trusted the international community. You can’t trust anyone. If you can’t defend yourself, you’re dead,” Efendiq confessed.
Although she is grateful for the Resolution approved at the UN – in May of this year – she also has an opinion of her own.
Efendiq says that that resolution is overdue, and it is a way for the internationals to wash away the sins of not helping them in 1995.
“We were an area protected by the UN, the resolution was approved to at least wash away their sins, because they did not want to help us in 1995”.
Identified victims continue to be buried every July 11. Today, there were 14 more.
