STAMENKOVSKI: WE MUST REMEMBER PREBILOVCI AND SAFEGUARD REPUBLIKA SRPSKA FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS

PREBILOVCI, AUGUST 5 /SRNA/ - Serbian Minister of Labor, Employment, Veterans and Social Affairs Milica Đurđević Stamenkovski said that Prebilovci is a sacred place for the Serb people and that the Prebilovci martyrs bear witness to a particular period in history, but stressed that the most important task is to safeguard Republika Srpska for future generations.

Stamenkovski stressed that Serbs have an obligation not only to remember their history but also to pass on to future generations the truth about the fate of the Serb people in occupation zones where there are now no Serb institutions. "This is not just a place on the map. For almost half a century, the truth lay buried deep underground—in the pits and in the methods of torture and killing introduced by the so-called Independent State of Croatia /NDH/, created under the wing of Hitler's Nazi regime," Stamenkovski told reporters in Prebilovci, where an evening service will be held tonight to mark the 85th anniversary of the Ustasha crime against Serbs. She said that at the time, such brutality and cruelty also had its ideological architects, who themselves found it hard to believe that one human being could inflict such evil on another. "Evil begins when a person no longer sees another person as a fellow human being, and that is precisely what happened here," she stressed. Stamenkovski reminded that it took many years for the truth to come to light. "'Here are our children'—those three words capture the depth of the Serb people's grief in this region. They were spoken by those waiting to receive the remains of the victims. Mothers and fathers uttered them because, after more than 40 years, they were finally able to be reunited with their murdered children, through their earthly remains," Stamenkovski said. She said that Serbs must never allow themselves to lose their state, independence or institutions. "As the ministry responsible for preserving the tradition of the liberation wars, together with our counterpart ministry in the Republika Srpska Government, we are creating a shared space of remembrance, collective memory and common values," Stamenkovski said. She stressed that this space cannot be confined by borders because it is universal and, as such, obliges all of us to visit together the places that embody the depth of our history and collective memory. "Prebilovci is synonymous with the suffering of the Serb people, but it is also a warning for the future and for all generations to come. The most harrowing example is the fate of teacher Stana Arnautović. She has become a symbol of childhoods cut short, empty school desks, unread books and lives interrupted in their youth. What the Ustashas did to her shows that they had genocidal intent and that it was all part of an attempt to uproot an entire people," she said. Stamenkovski said that revenge and retaliation are not an option and that preserving peace is the only way to ensure that future generations can be born.