His Excellency Douglas L. McElhaney
Ambassador of the United States of America to Bosnia and Herzegovina
Sarajevo

Your Excellency,

The news about plans to present the descendents of Draza Mihailovic with the Legion of Honor, which the President Harry Truman awarded him with 57 years ago, within the next few days has deeply upset and shaken the democratic and anti-fascist public of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

As you already know, after the bloody war and aggression that this country had endured, the inter-ethnic relations have remained extremely sensitive and vulnerable. Expression and encouragement of nationalism from either of the sides additionally complicate these relations, renewing the atmosphere of fear with rebirth of other nationalisms.

Bosnia and Herzegovina’s anti-fascists and human rights activists have no dilemma whatsoever that the Chetnik movement of the Second World War had collaborated with Nazi-fascists and had served Hitler and the Third Reich. The crimes committed by Chetniks against Muslims, Croats and anti-fascist Serbs, have been marked as historical facts, but have also remained imprinted in the memories of the peoples living in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Only in the region of the Drina valley, in Foca, Cajnice, Visegrad, Pljevlja, several tens of thousands of children, women, the elderly were bestially killed only because they were of different religion or ethnicity. These crimes were ordered directly by Draza Mihailovic, while the executors were members of the Ravna Gora Chetnic Movement, of which he was the military commander.

Your Excellency,

with utmost respect for the role of the United States of America in the anti-fascist coalition, which defeated bearers of the darkest ideology, as fascism was, and with greatest respect for the role that your country played and is still playing in promotion of democracy and human rights and liberties, I kindly ask you to pass on the request to your government not to hand over the Legion of Honor to descendents of Draza Mihailovic. You would that way contribute to the healing of deep war-inflicted wounds, the re-building of trust among peoples and reconciliation between members of different ethnic groups living here. Facing the past is certainly necessary for the future of this country, and this includes condemnation of fascism and prevention of its re-emergence.

I hope that you will receive this letter as a sign of good will and as an expression of friendship and respect for your country.

Yours sincerely,

Srdjan Dizdarevic
President of the Helsinki Committee for
Human Rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina