This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon: July 22, 2008 - Karadzic's capture comes too late for some Bosnians
For those waiting for justice, 13 years is better than nothing, but not by much. Radovan Karadzic, a Bosnian Serb leader wanted for war crimes, was arrested July 22 in Belgrade, Serbia.
Karadzic laid siege to Sarajevo and is charged with orchestrating massacres of Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica in the 1990s. He is charged with genocide.
Many in St. Louis' Bosnian community came from the Srebrenica region. The community has become one of the largest enclaves of Bosnians outside of Europe due to large influxes of refugees during the conflict in the 1990s. Most people we asked didn't want to talk about Karadzic. In Sukrija Dzidzovic's view, Karadzic's capture is bittersweet and most Bosnians in the area are sick of the topic.
"We're tired of him," says Dzidzovic, who runs the Bosnian newspaper Sabah. "The Americans are excited; the people in other parts of the world are excited. We are excited too, but... For 13 years, we are begging to arrest him – we are not asking. Everything came too late."
Karadzic had been a fugitive since 1996. Despite international efforts, he remained hidden in Serb-controlled parts of Bosnia, Montenegro and finally in Belgrade. His arrest comes after political changes in Serbia brought the pro-Western Boris Tadic to replacce the nationalist Vojislav Kostunica. Tadic brought about changes in Serbia's police intelligence agency, according to the Associated Press.
Eight thousand Bosnian Muslim men and boys were killed at Srebrenica.
Ten thousand people died during the shelling and siege of Sarajevo. The conflict began in 1992 and ended after U.S. and international intervention in 1996, a year after Srebrenica.
"Someone who knew Srebrenica would happen, who could have stopped it, didn't," Dzidzovic said. "They declared Srebrenica genocide 10 years too late."
The 63 year-old Karadzic was one of three under indictment for their actions in Bosnia. Two remain at large.
Dzidzovic came to the U.S. in 1995 as a refugee with $10 in his pocket. He had been a journalist during what the world calls the Bosnian War. He had also served in the Yugoslavian Army. In his view, what Karadzic and other Serbs did could not be called "war."
"We were almost all killed," Dzidzovic said. "In that time, you find body of Serbian guy that maybe our guys killed and you take documentation from his pocket and you see his address … maybe it's Belgrade, then you say, what is he here for? Passing through killing, is that war? That's genocide. I know what I learned in [the military academy] and Bosnia was not war."
Throughout his time in hiding, Karadzic still managed to find his way into the international spotlight. In 2005, he published a book of poetry under his own name in Serbia, according to AP reports.
Dzidzovic said that Karadzic's arrest only highlights a problem that is on-going in the former Yugoslavia – the continuing difficulty in tracking down those accused of crimes against humanity.
"It's one bad thing that so many war criminals are in Bosnia … are walking around on the streets," Dzidzovic said. "Can you imagine the concentration camp survivor in Bosnia comes to his home city and sees the man who beat him and he is now a businessman? A policeman?"
In the now-U.S.-citizen's view, the arrest of Karadzic and other fugitives may help serve as a reminder not to forget Bosnia's history in the future.
"In every war that comes through, Bosnians are paying the price. We are always forgetting and we are forgiving. Forgiving is good. But we are forgetting too fast what happened to us. Sure, we are happy he is arrested and that they will give him whatever justice he deserves. God will give him what he deserves."
Amelia Flood is a free-lance journalist.