“I approach each and every man as a human being. At no point do I care if he is from Pakistan, Morocco, Algeria. I see a human being in need in front of me, and I act in accordance to that. This is how it all starts actually,” says Senad Pirić as he begins his story of humanity, empathy and solidarity. Senad has dedicated himself to helping refugees and migrants.
Unity in diversity and mutual tolerance have always been present as a modus vivendi in Bosnian society, even during desperate times. The story of two religious leaders in Tuzla testifies to this, as they found a solution to a common issue, despite their differences. They had the same issue which was bigger than the differences between them – the question of human lives and death. And the solution to this issue was the mass burial of the victims of the massacre at Kapija, which was a mutual proposal by Muhamed effendi Lugavić and fra Petar Matanović.
Both documentary and poetic, the new play, ‘‘The Lullaby for Mladenka,’’ takes crimes against Croatian civilians from the village of Grabovica in September 1993 as its subject. Members of the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ARBiH) killed 33 Croatian civilians, the oldest of whom was 87 years old and the youngest four. Play’s author is Sead Đulić, and it’s performed by the Mostar Youth Theater (eMTeeM).
Sister Blanka and Mualima Šejla traveled on quite different paths through life, but those two paths left them with the same desires and motivations. Sister Blanka’s journey began in flat Slavonian County. Mualima Šejla, along with her mother and two sisters were forced out of Bratunac, a town in eastern Bosnia near Srebrenica, during the war. Eventually, these paths came together in Livno.
In a recent interview with Balkan Diskurs, Edhem Custovic discussed the recent establishment of the BH Futures Foundation (BHFF) and the launch of the Futures MakerSpace center in Srebrenica.