SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina — Hundreds of Bosnians took to the streets on Monday to demand authorities act to curb violence in opposition to girls after a person final week shot and killed his ex-wife whereas streaming the slaying reside on Instagram.
Protests have been held concurrently in a number of Bosnian cities. In Sarajevo, the capital, an enormous crowd of individuals walked by way of the town heart to press for extra safety for ladies, curbing of violent media content material and management of police work in {cases} of violence.
Members carried banners studying “Silence is approval,” “We cannot reside in concern” or “Cease femicide.” Protesters in Sarajevo held up an enormous banner studying “Sarajevo in opposition to violence,” echoing a slogan of monthslong road protests in neighboring Serbia.
“At the moment Sarajevo is saying no to violence and displaying assist to all of the victims of violence,” mentioned Mayor Benjamina Karic, who was on the entrance of the marching protesters.
Bosnia’s Human Rigths Minister Sevlid Hurtic referred to as for authorized adjustments to allow strict punishment for violence in opposition to girls and femicide.
Bosnia’s residents have been angered particularly due to experiences that the ladies who was killed on Friday within the northeastern city of Gradacac had reported harassment and violence to the authorities, and since the shooter had a police report.
The person posted a video on Instagram on Friday morning, telling viewers that they’d see a homicide reside. The video then reveals him taking a gun and firing a bullet into a girl’s brow because the cry of kid is heard from someplace close by. The video later was faraway from Instagram.
The shooter, recognized as Gradacac resident Nermin Sulejmanovic, additionally killed two extra folks and wounded three others earlier than killing himself. Bosnian media mentioned Sulejmanovic, 35, was a bodybuilder and health coach with previous arrests on costs of drug smuggling and attacking a police officer.
The sufferer, Nizama Hecimovic, was buried on Monday in Gradacac; a number of thousand folks attended her funeral.
Violence in opposition to girls is widespread in Bosnia and elsewhere within the Balkans the place societies are primarily conservative and male-dominated. The area additionally remains to be reeling from a collection of bloody conflicts within the Nineties’ that adopted the breakup of the previous Yugoslavia.
Bosnia stays ethnically tense and impoverished after the 1992-95 battle that killed 100,000 folks. In Serbia, two mass shootings in Might triggered road demonstrations calling for an finish to the tradition of violence, fueled by mainstream media and officers.