On the occasion of marking 5 February – the Day of Remembrance for the killed and wounded citizens of Sarajevo – an academic panel was held on 29 January 2026 at the Faculty of Islamic Studies (FIN) of the University of Sarajevo, dedicated to the siege of Sarajevo, contemporary narratives, and the denial of crimes. The panel, entitled “The Siege of Sarajevo: Narratives and Denial,” focused on an academic examination of the siege of Sarajevo in the context of contemporary interpretations, the culture of memory, and the denial of historically and legally established facts.
The guest lecturer was Dr. Zilha Mastalić Košuta from the Institute for Research of Crimes against Humanity and International Law at the University of Sarajevo, who spoke about the continuous denial of events from the period 1992–1995.
In her introductory remarks, Dr. Mastalić Košuta emphasized that already during the international armed conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and subsequently throughout the post-war period, there has been an organized and systematic revisionism regarding the siege of Sarajevo. This process, she stressed, involves the deliberate reinterpretation and denial of historical and legally established facts, despite the existence of extensive archival materials, military reports, testimonies of victims and observers, as well as numerous final and binding judgments of international and domestic courts.
In several judgments, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) unequivocally established that Sarajevo was subjected to a prolonged siege, during which a “coordinated, systematic, and prolonged campaign of shelling and sniper attacks was carried out with the aim of killing, maiming, wounding, and terrorizing the civilian population of Sarajevo.”
Furthermore, the ICTY determined the nature of the war in the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, qualifying it as an international armed conflict, and confirmed the existence of a Joint Criminal Enterprise (JCE) involving individuals from the highest structures of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro), as well as the highest political and military leadership of the Serbian Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, i.e., Republika Srpska. These judicially established facts have been further corroborated through the work of independent research institutions and academic studies. Nevertheless, despite such a body of evidence, narratives continue to appear in the public sphere that dispute the very concept of the siege, deny the scale of violence, or shift responsibility for the crimes.
More details about the lecture can be found at this or this link.
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