Page 503 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo II

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between them. Memorialization process in Bosnia and Herzegovina is divided along
ethno-national lines and each group and its political elite are engaged in commemora-
tions of their tragic events and glorification of their heroes, disregarding the facts that
are outside their memory discourse. With some exceptions, there are no memorials dedi-
cated to victims of all groups.
Besides that, Bosnia and Herzegovina does not have a satisfying legal framework for
the erection of memorials and lacks a law for memorialization on the state level. One of
the state laws that partially addresses this issue is the Article 20 of the “Law on Missing
Persons”, which gives the right to the families of missing persons or their associations
to request the marking of the locations of burials and exhumations, individual or joint,
4
with the approvals from the Missing Persons Institute and the local government. The
other law is the “Criteria for School Names and Symbols”, according to which an eligi-
ble schools symbol is: “A war memorial plaque containing names of the fallen, year of
birth and year of suffering, without interpretations and qualifications of the war, as well
as monuments with no offensive and unacceptable text messages.” However, the sur-
5
vey conducted by the non-governmental organization “Fondacija lokalne demokratije”
in 2008 revealed that 556 schools in the country (about 27%) have disputed symbols. 6
The bases for the erection of memorials are the laws of the two entities, the laws of
the cantons of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the legislation of the “au-
tonomous” Brčko District. Anyone can submit a demand for the erection of memorials
7
and these are usually initiated by the organizations of surviving victims and war veterans
and the families of victims, but are mostly funded by administrations, private donors
or international actors. Until now, the experience has shown that the erection of war
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memorials usually entirely depends on the willingness of local authorities to grant the
necessary permits and funding. This gives the freedom to the ethno-national group that
is in the majority in one local community to commemorate only their victims and their
military formations not allowing minority groups to mark the places of their suffering.
As a consequence, in the Republika Srpska most of the memorials are dedicated to the
Army of the Republika Srpska (Vojska Republike Srpske, VRS), while in the Federa-
tion of Bosnia and Herzegovina memorials honor the Army of Bosnia and Herzego-

3 A survey conducted in 2005 by Ronald Kostić shows that Croat, Serb and Bosniak interviewes have differ-
ent interpretations regarding the role the military forces played during the conflict. A majority of the Croat
respondents (92.7%) named the Croatian Defense Council as defenders; most Bosniaks (91.4%) named the
Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, while 89.6% of the Serbs named the Army of Republika Srpska. In the
same survey in 2010 there was almost no change. Majority of Bosniaks and Croats characterize the war as an
aggression, most Serbs see it as a civil war. Ronald Kostić, Transitional Justice and Reconciliation in Bosnia-
Herzegovina, Whose Memories, Whose Justice? in SOCIOLOGIJA, Vol. LIV (2012), No. 2, pp. 655-657,
http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/img/doi/0038-0318/2012/0038-03181204649K.pdf
4 Institut za nestale osobe, Zakon o nestalim osobama, 2004, http://www.ino.ba/index.php?option=com_conte
nt&view=article&id=24%3Azakon-o-nestalim osobama&catid=11%3Azakoni&Itemid=35&lang=bs.
5 Kriterij za školske nazive i simbole, II Kriterij za školske simbole. 1. Prihvatljivi školski simboli (C).
6 Fonacija lokalne demokratije, Analiza provedbe kriterija za školske nazive i obilježja, Sarajevo, 2008. p. 29.
7 Minisarstvo za ljudska prava i izbjeglice, Strategija..., pp. 62-64.
8 Jasmina Tepić, Perspective series..., p. 27.