As we have previously, we are compiling a report on our most important activities in the preceding period.
If you are interested in more information, please contact us. We would be very happy to share further details with you.
Street Action
In this period, our street actions were connected to marking important dates - the dates of crimes committed in our name and remembering and marking the fifteenth anniversary of important events and dates in the history of the antiwar movement in Serbia.
We also organized actions to mark important international dates and actions of global solidarity.
March 8 International Women's Day – we participated in the street actions 'You Have Rights' and 'Stop Discrimination against Women' put on by the youth and women's sections of The Independent Union.
March 21, International Day for the Elimination of Racism—actions were undertaken under the slogan 'Equality' and included demands that Serbia adopt an antidiscrimination law. In this event, which we organized with Belgrade’s Queeria Center, we pointed out the different forms of discrimination that ethic, cultural, and sexual minorities, especially Roma, face in Serbia.
March 26, Justice for Victims, Punishment for Perpetrators—a commemorative vigil in Republic Square in Belgrade on the eighth anniversary of the crime in Suva Reka, Kosovo. Eight years previously, employees of the Serbian Interior Ministry killed 48 Kosovar Albanians, 46 of whom were members of the Berisha family.
In this period, we also attended commemorations on the anniversaries of the deaths of anti-war activists in Belgrade, including Miladin Zivotic, Biljana Jovanovic, and Jelena Santic. Additionally, with other citizens, we commemorated the third anniversary of the murder of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic.
Confronting the Past—A Feminist Approach
We continued this educational project, which includes many segments. In this reporting period, we carried out the following activities.
Political Remembering as Civic Responsibility—Remembering the Resistance: This is a positive dimension of confronting the past and a form of creating alternative models of transitional justice. In the framework of this 'new' segment, we organized the following activities:
• March 3: Remembering Miladin Zivotic, a gathering on the tenth anniversary of the death of Miladin Zivotic, anti-war activist and founder of Belgrade Circle. This event was organized by Belgrade Circle, The Center for Cultural Decontamination, and Women in Black. Guests from Sarajevo and Zagreb also attended.
• March 20, Fifteen Years of Women's Peace Activism—Fifteen Years of Nonviolent Resistance, a panel discussion and screening of 'Always Disobedient,' a film about the history and activism of Women in Black was held in The Museum of Vojvodina in Novi Sad. The event was organized by Women's Studies and Research—Novi Sad as part of their tenth anniversary celebration.
Transitional Justice from a Feminist Standpoint: In the reporting period, the following panel discussions, lectures, and workshops were held:
- January 24: An evaluation of the activities related to transitional justice from a feminist standpoint. Thirty-three women activists from 13 Serbian cities (Belgrade, Novi Pazar, Dimitrovgrad, Pirot, Velika Plana, Leskovac, Krusevac, Nis, Kikinda, Zajecar, Tutin, Vrbas, and Novi Sad) participated.
- March 16-18: An educational seminar and training of trainers on 'Confronting the Past—A Feminist Approach' was held in Belgrade. It was requested by Women in Black Network—Serbia activists in order to provide them with further education and training for work in the field. Workshops and lectures were held about responsibility, the feminist ethic of care, models of transitional justice, and Women in Black's experiences with transitional justice. Twenty-two women activists from eight cities (Belgrade, Novi Sad, Nis, Tutin, Krusevac, Novi Pazar, Zaječar, and Vrbas) participated in this training.
- March 27: Two lectures entitled 'Transitional Justice—A Feminist Approach' were given by a Women in Black activist. This event was organized by Women's Studies, Belgrade.
- March 30—April 1: A regional seminar entitled 'Confronting the Past—A Feminist Approach' was held in Jastrebac, near Krusevac. The seminar included workshops and lectures on 'From a Feminist Ethic of Care to Civic Responsibility,' 'Responsibility and Me,' 'From Models of Transitional Justice to a Feminist Approach to Transitional Justice,' and 'Women in Black's Experiences of a Feminist Approach to Transitional Justice.' Thirty civil society and political party activists from nine cities (Vrbas, Belgrade, Niš, Kraljevo, Velika Plana, Vlasotince, Kruševac, Novi Pazar, and Zajecar) participated.
The Punishment of Crime—The Path to a Just Peace: We follow trials in The Special Court for War Crimes in Belgrade. Since the beginning (December 2005) of the trial of members of the Scorpions paramilitary units accused of murdering Bosniak civilians in July 1995 as part of the genocide in Srebrenica, Women in Black Network—Serbia activists have systematically followed the trial. In this period, the following court sessions were held:
- January 31, 2007, which was attended by nine activists from four cities (Belgrade, Zajecar, Leskovac, and Pirot)
- March 12, 2007, which was attended by ten activists from Belgrade and one activist from Krusevac.
Trials for the crime in Suva Reka: Serbian Interior Ministry employees killed 48 Kosovar Albanian civilians on March 26, 1999 in Suva Reka, Kosovo. The trial began on October 1, 2006. Women in Black activists have attended all sessions of the trial.
- January 10-12, 2007, which was attended by five activists from two cities (Belgrade and Krusevac)
- February 1-5, 2007, which was attended by eight activists from four cities (Belgrade, Leskovac, Dimitrovgrad, and Pirot).
- March 5-9, 2007, which was attended by four activists from two cities (Belgrade and Krusevac)
While following trials, Women in Black activists offer support to the families of the victims, meet with them after the trial sessions, and write reports of the trial proceedings, among other activities.
To See, To Know, To Change: video projections of documentary material about war crimes, but also the resistance to war and war crimes, in the former Yugoslavia and other regions. In this period, fiction and documentary films by Jasmila Zbanic from Sarajevo were shown, as well as the documentary film ‘Carnival,’ which is about crimes against Bosniak refugees in Montenegro in 1992. ‘Carnival’ was directed by Seki Radoncic and Alen Drljevic. In this program cycle, we also screened two films about the genocide in Rwanda, ‘Hotel Rwanda,’ which was based on a true story, and the documentary film ‘God Sleeps in Rwanda’ by Kimberlee Acquaro and Stacy Sherman. After the screenings, there were discussions about confronting the past and transitional justice from a feminist standpoint. During the past three months, film screenings and discussions were held by Women in Black Network—Serbia activists:
In Belgrade, the following films were shown:
- Grbavica, January 31
- Films by Jasmila Zbanic, February 7
- Hotel Rwanda, February 21
- Carnival, February 28
Approximately 50 activists attended the film screenings.
Conferences – Public Testimony. Women in Black activists participated in the following activities organized by the Fund for Humanitarian Law:
- Celebici, beyond Reasonable Doubt, February 24, 2007. Nine Women in Black Network—Serbia activists participated.
- From Impunity to Responsibility, March 17, 2007. Three Women in Black activists participated.
Networks and Coalitions
The Women in Black Network—Serbia: On January 25 and 26, there was a two-day meeting in Belgrade in the Women in Black—Belgrade office. Thirty-three activists from 13 cities (Belgrade, Novi Pazar, Dimitrovgrad, Pirot, Velika Plana, Leskovac, Kruševac, Niš, Kikinda, Zajecar, Tutin, Vrbas, and Novi Sad) participated. During the network meeting, joint activities for the next three-month period were discussed.
The Feminist Coalition: In this period, the autonomous women’s groups in Belgrade who make up The Feminist Coalition (The Autonomous Women’s Center, The Incest Trauma Center, Voice of Difference, The Reconstruction Women’s Fund, Women’s Studies, and Women in Black) held three meetings with the aim of cooperating, offering mutual support, and planning joint activities.
The Women’s Peace Coalition: On March 28 and 29 in Pristina, Kosovo, a meeting of the members of the Coalition (The Kosova Women’s Network and The Women in Black Network—Serbia) was held. Six activists from each network participated. The Women in Black activists were from Belgrade, Krusevac, Tutin, Zajecar, and Vrbas. In the meeting, future activities were arranged, including an upcoming conference in Struga, Macedonia.
Warning Signs of Fundamentalism and Feminist Responses:
In this three-month period we organized:
- Internal workshops and discussions about the clericalization of society and its effects on women’s human rights;
- meetings in preparation for a research project on regional seminars and a research project on reproductive rights, clericalization, and security.
Mutual Support – Women’s Solidarity at Work: This includes diverse activities which were organized with aligned organizations with the aim of strengthening civil society, widening the space for women’s autonomy, and supporting the growth of autonomous groups.
International Politics
This includes participation in international conferences (official and alternative), contact with international institutions, and activist visits and exchanges.
Participation in alternative and official conferences – we will mention only those which we helped to coordinate or in which we gave presentations or lectures:
- ‘Strengthening the Capacity of Youth for LGBT Activism,’ a regional conference organized by The Youth Initiative for Human Rights in Pristina, Kosovo, January 23-26. At this conference, the coordinators of The Women in Black Network—Serbia and The Kosova Women’s Network gave lectures about solidarity and activism.
- ‘Establishing the Truth about War Crimes and Conflicts,’ a regional conference in Zagreb organized by Belgrade’s Fund for Humanitarian Law, Zagreb’s Document, and Sarajevo’s Research and Documentation Center. It occurred on February 8 and 9.
- ‘Impunity and Reconciliation,’ a conference in Barcelona, Spain on February 15-17. Tamara Kaliterna, a Women in Black activist, participated in this conference. There were participants from Spain, Serbia, Palestine, and Latin America at this conference.
- ‘The Participation of Women in Changing Society—Regional Experiences,’ organized by The Center for Regionalism of Novi Sad and The Mother Teresa Society of Pristina. Marija Perkovic, a Women in Black activist from Vrbas spoke on a panel about women in peace processes on February 9.
- ‘Towards a Feministic Security Policy,’ an international seminar organized by Kvinna Till Kvinna, a Swedish foundation, in Stockholm on March 14-15.
Publishing Activities: a continuation of the work to prepare our most important publishing activities, the Women for Peace anthology, an anthology about women’s testimony about war, and brochures about transitional justice.
Additionally, in this reporting period, we organized working meetings, as well as numerous workshops and discussions in the Women in Black office.
April 3, 2007, Belgrade
(Report prepared by Ljilja, Milos, Stasa, and Rachel)
