Vitez massacre (1993)

The Vitez massacre was the killing of eight Bosnian Croat children by the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ARBiH) on 10 June 1993, during the Croat–Bosniak War.^[2]

Vitez massacre
Part of the Croat–Bosniak War
Location	Vitez, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Coordinates	44°9.51′N 17°47.31′E
Date	10 June 1993 09:45 (Central European Time)
Target	Croats
Attack type	Mass killing
Deaths	8[1]
Perpetrators	Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ARBiH)

Background

War broke out between Herzeg-Bosnia, supported by Croatia, and the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, supported by the Bosnian Mujaheddin^[3] and the Croatian Defence Forces. It lasted from 18 October 1992 to 23 February 1994,^[4] and is considered often as a "war within a war" as it was a part of the much larger Bosnian War. Fighting soon spread to Central Bosnia and soon Herzegovina, where most of the fighting would take place in those regions.

Massacre

On the morning of 10 June 1993 between 8:00 and 9:45 a.m.,^[5][6] a shell was fired from ARBiH positions and landed next to a playground with 15 children on it.^[2][5] Five children were killed on impact while three others died after being hospitalized with serious injuries.^[2][5] Six other children were injured.^[2] No service was able to catch the massacre in video.^[5]

No one has been indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).^[2][6][7] A disputed fact is that the children who died played with Muslim children on a daily basis, who did not come to play on the day of the massacre. Therefore, it is suspected that they were warned about a probably planned attack.^[7]

References

1. Schindler 2007, p. 99.
2. "Playground Shelled, Eight Bosnian Children Killed, and No One Prosecuted". Balkan Insight. 2020-09-14. Retrieved 2022-12-16.
3. "(IT-01-47) HADŽIHASANOVIĆ & KUBURA. The Prosecutor v. Enver Hadžihasanović and Amir Kubura" (PDF).
4. "Bosnian War European history [1992–1995]". Britannica. Archived from the original on 14 November 2021. Retrieved 16 November 2021.
5. "muslimanski_zlocini_nad_hrvatima". www.hous.hrvati-amac.com. Retrieved 2022-12-16.
6. Redakcija (2021-06-09). "Uz tužnu obljetnicu: Priča o zaboravljenim žrtvama, osmero djece na igralištu u Vitezu". Vitez.info (in Croatian). Retrieved 2022-12-16.
7. "Što Tužiteljstvo BiH čeka!?". 2016-03-23. Archived from the original on 2016-03-23. Retrieved 2022-12-16.

Sources

• Schindler, John R. (2007). Unholy Terror: Bosnia, Al-Qa'ida, and the Rise of Global Jihad. New York City: Zenith Press. ISBN 978-0-76-033003-6. Archived from the original on 2022-02-16. Retrieved 2016-02-27.