Dr. David Pettigrew, professor of Philosophy and Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Southern Connecticut State University, and member of the Steering Committee Yale University Genocide Studies Program, warned that the ideology of the ‘Serbian World’ is an "existential threat to Bosnia and Herzegovina" which the EU and NATO must respond to.
Here is prof. dr. Pettigrew's speech at the annual press conference Krug 99 association of intellectuals:
“A guiding assumption of the ideology of the “Serbian World” is that Bosnia and Herzegovina does not exist as a unified multicultural sovereign state. According to the recent Declaration of the All-Serb Assembly, Bosnia is only a collection of entities with three separate peoples or “nations,” each with vital interests and veto power. The Declaration privileges Republika Srpska as a “unified and independent” sovereign entity. Hence the Serbian World has subjected Bosnia as a sovereign state to an ideological erasure. Such a delegitimization and conceptual erasure of Bosnia as a sovereign state represents an existential threat with dire consequences.
Such a conceptual erasure is similar to the erasure of Ukraine by the “Russian World.” For the proponents of the Russian World, Ukraine and its people do not exist. Putin’s ideologues declared that Ukraine did not exist, that it was “soft tissue” between Russia and West, and that Ukrainians had somehow forgotten they were Russians. In this sense, Russia has already erased the existence of Ukraine as a state with its own culture and history. The illegal invasion and its murderous cruelties are a brutal effort to affirm that pathological worldview.
Following the adoption of the UN Resolution on the Srebrenica Genocide, Republika Srpska and Serbia responded with the “Declaration of the All-Serb Assembly,” the latest manifesto of the Serbian World. The Declaration envisions an exclusive ethno-territoriality for the Serbian people as a “unique whole” that is analogous to the irredentist plan for “Greater Serbia” in the 1990s that sought to incorporate Bosnia and other areas of the Balkans as though they did not exist unto themselves. The Declaration, as in the case of the SANU Memorandum, alleges persecution of Serbs and proposes to respond with a cultural and political separatism. The proposed unity of all Serbs in one state clearly comes at the expense of Bosnia and its citizens.
A year prior to the Declaration of the All-Serb Assembly, in April 2023, Milorad Dodik had called for the unification of all Serbs proclaiming that “No one will prevent us [Serbs] from uniting because it is our right and our history. The last century was the century of Serbian suffering, and this century is one of Serbian unification.” Two years earlier, in August 2021, Mr. Dodik asserted that Bosnians were a “subject people” who, because they were “converts,” lacked the character necessary to govern. He concluded that the Bosnian state was “an illusion that could not function.” These pronouncements—which have been challenged as hate speech–underline the fact that Serbian World entails the delegitimization of Bosnia as a state and of Bosnians as citizens.
It is as though the Serbian and Russian Worlds have conspired to erase Bosnia in Vidrići in Republika Srpska, where a Russian-style Orthodox Church was constructed along with a Russian Orthodox Cross. The plaque on the cross honors fallen fighters, including Russian mercenaries who died in the so-called “defensive-patriotic war” (1992-1995). The phrase –defensive-patriotic war”— involves a revisionist narrative that glorifies the perpetrators, denies the genocide, and intends to erase Bosnia, since its terrain is now described as a “homeland” that is defended by Orthodox “brothers”. It should not escape our attention that Putin’s official foreign policy is to “unify orthodoxy” as he seeks to lend his full support to “brother peoples”.
Such efforts at conceptual erasure take other more subtle, but equally pernicious forms. The High Representative and the Republic of Croatia attempted to influence the Kovačević case by intervening in the proceedings as “Third Parties,” in order to prevent democratic reforms in Bosnia. Such interventions can be seen as a coordinated effort to divide Bosnia so as to ensure that it will never be able to exist as a democratic society. One should not fail to notice the coincidental timing of the “voluntary contribution” of 100,000 euros made by the Republic of Croatia to the ECHR. Further, the denials of the genocide by Vučić and Dodik, and the prohibition of memorials for the victims at atrocity sites such as Pilica Cultural Center and Barutni magacin in Kalinovik, intend to erase Bosniaks by suppressing the memory of their suffering.
With the ideology of the Serbian World the victims of genocide and other war crimes are dehumanized and rendered invisible. This is an eliminationist ideology which must be confronted because, as
in the case of Ukraine, it indicates a state of mind that is preliminary to violent persecution and genocide that are imminent. While Aleksandar Vulin has been identified as the main proponent of the Serbian world with his pronouncements that the unification of all Serbs in one state has already begin and cannot be stopped, the entire leadership of Republika Srpska and Serbia are now taking systematic steps to achieve the genocidal goals of the 90s.
Let 2025 be the year that actions are taken to prevent the Serbian and Russian worlds from achieving their goals that threaten the existence of Bosnia. Bosnia’s EU accession and membership in NATO must be accelerated. Let 2025 be the year when the Serbian World is condemned and “Republika Srpska Day” is banned. Steps must be taken in 2025 to support democratic constitutional reforms consistent with the judgements of the European Court of Human Rights. In 2025, as we commemorate the Srebrenica genocide, survivors must be supported in their efforts to establish memorials and museums at atrocity sites such as Pilica Cultural Center, and Barutni magacin in Kalinovik so that the victims and the truth are properly remembered and the crimes will not be repeated. In these ways, the Serbian and Russian Worlds and their efforts to undermine Bosnia as a democratic nation will be neutralized and Bosnia’s existence as a democratic multicultural state under the rule of law will be affirmed“.
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