Foreign reporters who covered the Bosnian war joined the choir of critics of Peter Handke’s Nobel Prize for literature and posted their reports and photos about the war crimes he allegedly denies online.
Using the hashtag #BosniaWarJournalists, the reporters commented on their work, saying “I was there.”
Among them is the current Communications Director at Human Rights Watch, Emma Daly, who covered the wars in former Yugoslavia for The Independent:
I will never forget walking around the mass graves holding hundreds of men & boys who were blindfolded, shot & buried on farmland near Srebrenica. We know Milosevic was responsible.#Handke #NobelPrize #BosniaWarJournalists https://t.co/Im1TaC3nB4 pic.twitter.com/Az1OkjZ50d
— EmmaDaly (@EmmaDaly) December 9, 2019
US author and news director at the New Yorker magazine, David Stephenson Rohde, reported on the ethnic cleansing of Muslims in Bosnia in 1994:
Peter Handke: My story from 8/18/95: "At one site shown in the spy photos this reporter saw what appeared to be a decomposing human leg protruding from the freshly turned dirt." #Handke #NobelPrize #BosniaWarJournalists https://t.co/KUvJKXkzzR pic.twitter.com/Tw42RkBMrM
— David Rohde (@RohdeD) December 10, 2019
Senior Fellow at Yale University's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, Janine di Giovanni, who covered the Bosnian war for several outlets, including The Times Magazine, wrote that she witnessed rape, ethnic cleansing and genocide in Bosnia, calling Handke a genocide denier:
Here's what I saw in #Bosnia: mass rape, ethnic cleansing, genocide. Tomorrow, #Handke gets a #NobelPrize. He's a genocide denier. My colleagues and I are posting our #Bosnia stories to remind you of what happened there. #BosniaWarJournalists. https://t.co/FA8iJ5WuSC
— Janine di Giovanni (@janinedigi) December 9, 2019
Human Rights Watch Interim Deputy Director for the US Program, Laura Pitter, covered the war in Bosnia for Time Magazine and the Reuters News Agency:
Proud to stand with former #BosniaWarJournalists #BosnianWarReporters to protest #NobelPrize being given to Peter #Handke tomorrow. I was there, first as a reporter, then for @hrw, and saw the crimes he attempts to whitewash in his writings firsthand. https://t.co/uaxgVRWlob
— Laura Pitter (@Laurapitter) December 9, 2019
BBC Middle East Editor Jeremy Bowen also reported from Bosnia in the 1990s:
I reported all the Yugo wars. Saw monstrous crimes. #BosniaWarJournalists #Handke #NobelPrize Later testified at war crimes trials, inc those of Bosnian Serb leaders Karadzic & Mladic. The grim detail in court records https://t.co/nfiRcCPbMk
— Jeremy Bowen (@BowenBBC) December 9, 2019
Editor at The Intercept, Peter Maass, is the author of ‘Love Thy Neighbor: A Story of War’ in 1996, which speaks about his experiences while covering the Bosnian war:
One of Handke's lies — all sides had same camps. False. Serbs had network directed from top, intentionally murderous, thousands detained, many killed. #BosniaWarJournalists #Handke #NobelPrize https://t.co/vmCJ4m6NfP
— Peter Maass (@maassp) December 10, 2019
CNN’s Christiane Amanpour is well known for her reports from Sarajevo during the siege of the city:
I was there. We all know who's guilty. #handke #bosnia #BosniaWarJournalists pic.twitter.com/DL2nb8WAQY
— Christiane Amanpour (@camanpour) December 9, 2019
War photographer Morten Hvaal, who covered the Sarajevo siege for the Associated Press posted his photo of a scene from the Kosevo hospital morgue:
No #Nobel prize should ever be awarded #genocide denier Peter #Handke. My colleagues #BosniaWarJournalists and I were there. We counted the dead. We gathered the evidence. We testified to the world. #realnews… https://t.co/UsbvDgkcKF
— Morten Hvaal (@MortenHvaal) December 9, 2019
Award-winning photographer Dr. Paul Lowe, Course Leader at London College of Communication, also posted photos he shot during the Bosnian war:
RELATED NEWS
