In this Newsletter we want to inform you about recent developments in Srebrenica, and about the activities relating to our project of "Foreign Civilian Presence".

About one hundred survivors have now returned to Srebrenica Township. Hundreds of Serbs, living in the houses of Bosniaks, have left during the winter months. The houses stand empty now, awaiting renovation.

More than 500 people have returned to the surrounding villages, more precisely, to what is left of those villages. Many hundreds of houses have already been rebuilt. But the biggest obstacle to return – no jobs, no means of support – is still cause for concern and demands our attention.

It is no longer just the elderly who are returning to Srebrenica, families with children are beginning to take the plunge. Their children are going to school. In general this is going well, although it is not totally without its difficulties.

Bosniaks and Serbs are working together in several local organizations: Srebrenica’99, which was started in Tuzla by refugees, now also operates in Srebrenica, after several of its instigators returned to Srebrenica. Danas i Sutra (Today and Tomorrow) is a new organization of local people in Srebrenica. There are several other organizations, which are open to members of both communities. A Bosnian woman sometimes takes part in the activities organized by Amica, a Serbian organization. Integration is easier at Sarah’s, a Serbian youth organization.

There are regular public meetings in which both Bosniak and Serbian inhabitants are able to communicate their frustration at the slow rate of improvements in Srebrenica. In these meetings the recurring themes are those which constitute the main obstacles to return: health care, education and the lack of work and means of support. These matters require serious attention.

In the previous two and a half years a lot of hard work has gone into the identification of recovered bodies, using the latest DNA technology. Thousands of bodies must still be identified. But the work is beginning to bear results. This is of major importance to survivors. Once a body has been identified, family members get certainty, and are able to start grieving. Identification is also important because there are still Serbs who declare that the genocide did not take place, or that the recovered bodies are those of Serbs. Identification is thus also a way of establishing truth. In the meantime a burial site for 8000 bodies has been prepared in Potocari, opposite the compound of the former Dutch Battalion. On 31 March of this year the first 600 bodies which had been identified, were buried there. Volunteers and our coordinators Kathleen Gabriels and Bob Janssen participated as Dutch nationals, discreetly in the background. It was a massive gathering. Imams prayed and then visited all the graves, where thousands of family members buried their sons and husbands. Students from Sarajevo’s Organisation of students from Srebrenica placed two flowers on each grave.

Last autumn we made an appeal to you to donate money for our "Music Bus for Srebrenica". We were hoping to raise at least 28,800 Euro, which amount would then be quintupled by the Wilde Ganzen [Wild Geese] and the development organization IOCC. We received many donations. And our fundraising concerts are still continuing until May. This fantastic response has made that the amount we were hoping to achieve has been greatly exceeded. We have enough money to run the project for two years. We have also received a multitude of musical instruments. "Musicians without Borders" are checking all the instruments. We are undertaking this project together with them.

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In the meantime Marijke Smedema has arrived in Srebrenica with the bus full of musical instruments. Marijke is an orthopaedic music teacher, who was in Srebrenica as a volunteer in 2001. Now she is employed by us to implement the Music Bus project. The project is beginning to take shape. The first of the intended weekly music activities in Srebrenica has started. Marijke approaches Bosniak families to facilitate the participation of their children in these activities. It is a big step initially to participate in activities in which Serbian children by far outnumber the Bosniak ones. Marijke also helped out with a musical that was being put on at the school by another volunteer. She is visiting several refugee camps and will establish more permanent activities there after a period of trial and gathering information and experience. She also regularly visits the village of Suceska [site of the first return to Srebrenica municipality, RV]. On her visits she is accompanied by an English volunteer, who teaches English there. There are now 14 children in Suceska.

Bosniak conservatorium students from Sarajevo will be included in the Music Bus project. It can be a training course for them; some of them will be involved in organizing workshops and events. We have established the first contacts.

"Musicians without Borders" will support the project with their own musical activities. In July and October they will be performing and having workshops for children and Bosnian musicians/music teachers, while travelling through Bosnia. Marijke draws on the contacts she has developed with them over the course of the years; they provide her with a musical sounding board.

The huge response to the project and the many fundraising concerts have created a large network of interested people, which will grow even bigger thanks to the coming fundraising concerts.

We welcome volunteers who can work with music as we welcome music students who are searching for an opportunity to complete their training course.

Since September two doctors of Snaga Zhene (Women’s Strength) have been travelling to Srebrenica on a fortnightly basis, to hold surgery in what is left of the local hospital, the Dom Zdravlje. We started this project because Bosniaks still felt unsafe about being seen by a Serbian doctor. Serbian people who cannot pay or do not have insurance also use this service. Each time there are about 50 to 70 patients waiting in the waiting room. The doctors work in collaboration with the local medical staff. In the off-week our volunteers visit people at home; they change dressings or beds as required, and carry out other basic social welfare tasks. This includes a lot of coffee drinking, eating and talking with the families. The visits are not being hurried. Some of the visits are done in tandem with a Serbian nurse.

The threshold for visiting the hospital has been lowered in this way, and another opportunity for contact between Bosniaks and Serbs created. Rio Peters, up to 2 April a volunteer in Srebrenica writes: "A lot of illnesses are related to stress: high blood pressure, diabetes. A conspicuous number of women have sore knees and hips. This can be related to their lives of toil. I have come across situations that are plainly degrading. The most elementary medical supplies are lacking. As far as the care for those who are incontinent or confined to their beds is concerned: there are no nappies or plastic covers for mattresses".

Since December this health project is being paid for by a grant of the Dutch government. Before that time we used your donations to finance it. We would like to improve the medical facilities as part of this project. We are looking for a variety of medical equipment or money to buy it.

The men who used to live in the villages before the war also worked in the mines or factories around Srebrenica. A majority of the men did not return after the war, and the factories and mines are no longer in operation. This means that the people who are returning to the villages are now totally dependent on crop growing and livestock to support themselves. We can make a contribution here by donating chickens. Former volunteers and their supporters have donated money in the past to buy chickens for women who have returned. We want to expand this activity. We have funding to build chicken runs and provide people with laying hens and fodder. We are thus creating a chicken farm for single women which will provide them with a basic income. Ten women will be given 200 hens. In initial conversations with the women it transpired that they are finding it hard to start thinking about the organizational aspects of this undertaking. They have only just returned and their first interest is to get their house and gardens organized and to provide food for the family. "We’ll take the 20 chicks and fatten them up and then eat them, and perhaps sell a few", they say. That is a practical solution for the moment. We want to support that, but continue on a different scale with a few women. In the coming months (April and May), three volunteers will be building chicken runs and hens will be delivered. We will also pay attention to marketing.

We have received a grant from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to finance projects. It allows us to pay for a few smaller projects, but also to finance a bigger one, like our tractor project. We will be working in collaboration with the newly started cooperation. The tractors in question are 2-wheel mini tractors. We will share them out over the area. Everybody is entitled to having 1 dullum (1000m²⁾ ploughed for free. Further services will need to be paid for.

Rijksscholengemeenschap Enkhuizen [Enkhuizen comprehensive school] has collected money for schools in Srebrenica. After checking with them we have decided to divide the money between the secondary school in Srebrenica (where the school population is still 98% Serbian), the school in Tinja, home to refugees from Srebrenica, and the new school in Sasse (Srebrenica municipality), where many people have returned to this year. It is the intention to start communication per e-mail between the schools in Enkhuizen, Srebrenica and Tinja, once computers have been installed.

On 21 April there will be a performance by Circus Dambo [from Srebrenica], in Goor [the Netherlands], as part of the children’s circus championships. 26 Bosniak and Serbian children will be coming to the Netherlands. The circus was started by Marion Reffeltrath, one of our volunteers, who is presently in Srebrenica to prepare the children for this trip, together with Marenne Jansen. They are also planning a summer camp for Bosniak and Serbian children, and a tour around Bosnia with the circus.

Students from Sarajevo have been funded by us, i.e. by you, for the last two years. We have supported them with computers for a study-and internet room, and contributed to their office costs. This has enabled them to apply for bursaries for students and to alleviate other needs. These students are visiting Srebrenica ever more.

At the moment there are 11 volunteers in Srebrenica, including four English volunteers. In the past months employees from Srebrenica’s town hall have been attending computer courses given by volunteers. They received 16 computers last October. Many workers in the town hall have had no experience with computers.

At the primary school a musical was organized. It was open to all the students of all six classes. In Bosnia it is still customary for only the best students to participate in performances. Also, the audience was sitting in a circle around the performers, rather than in rows, behind one another. Our "Dutch" way of doing things felt a bit uncomfortable at first, but was much appreciated in the end.

In the near future your contributions will be used for: