JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1995, Pages 48, 92

Special Report

An Investment in Bosnia's Future

By Aisha (Gray Henry) Gouverneur

By now there are many Americans who are participating personally in relief efforts for the people of Bosnia, and many more who would like to become involved. There are various ways to do so, and from my own personal experience I can suggest one or two. The involvement of the Islamic Texts Society dates back to 1992, soon after the April outbreak of hostilities between Bosnian Serbs and the Muslim-led multisectarian government.

The Society's office in Cambridge, England began by working with the British HAMD organization to send food convoys and surgical teams to Bosnia. HAMD is currently operating a mobile hospital unit in the southwestern Bosnian city of Mostar.

As director of the American branch of the Islamic Texts Society in Louisville, KY, my own active involvement began in the spring of 1993 when I contacted Bosnian Prime Minister Haris Silajdzic to see if I, as a concerned American Muslim, could lend a hand in the refugee camps. Haris and I were school friends back in 1968, and in fact he was the first visitor to my daughter, Haajar, when she was born.

After I began working at the Bosnian embassy in Zagreb, Croatia, it occurred to me that, given its capacity as a publisher and translation institute, the Islamic Texts Society could make a contribution to Bosnia in the field of education. Various projects on sirah (biography of the Prophet Muhammad) and hadith (reports of the Prophet's sayings and actions) were formulated and conveyed by Haris Silajdzic to Dr. Enes Karic, the minister of education and culture in Sarajevo. The Society also donated the copyright and underwrote the cost of printing a Serbo-Croatian translation by Bosnian scholar Dr. Rusmir Mahmud Cehajic of Martin Lings' Muhammad.

It was a separate request from Dr. Karic, however, that opened my eyes to the urgency of the hard-pressed newly independent country's educational needs, and to a project to which any concerned American could make a significant contribution. Besides the government's requirement for substantial funds to print textbooks, Dr. Karic wrote that "having recently visited the free territories of Bosnia and Herzegovina, I realized that our children were in real need of pencils and notebooks. If we bear in mind that there are 300,000 students within the territories under our actual control, and if each of them is to be supplied with an average of ten notebooks and five pencils or pens, you can see the complexity of our request and the significance if this educational material were supplied on time and delivered to our students."

The Islamic Texts Society accepted the challenge of meeting Dr. Karic's plea for school supplies, and the process of obtaining and transporting the materials already has begun. The Crayola company has offered to donate Pentel pens and the Kentucky-based PlanGraphics company is arranging for some computers to be sent to Bosnia. In Louisville, Office Depot has offered pens, pencils and notebooks at cost, and the Gateway printing concern is donating paper remnants from its major print runs.

Nevertheless, the quantity of school supplies still needed by the children of Bosnia is staggering. This is an opportunity for readers of the Washington Report to mobilize individuals, organizations and companies able to donate extra pencils, pens, notebooks, computers and other educational supplies, and to ship them directly to the Bosnian government.

Both Prime Minister Silajdzic and Education Minister Karic have requested that material be sent to the Bosnian Ministry of Education via the Bosnian embassy in Zagreb (see contact on page 92). Bosnian Ambassador to the U.S. Sven Alkalaj suggests shipping heavy items directly to the Croatian port of Rijeka. To expedite collection at Rijeka, donors should fax the Bosnian embassy in Washington and the Islamic Texts Society information on what material was collected and when it was shipped. Individuals who prefer to donate money for the purchase of school supplies and the cost of shipping the material to Bosnia may transfer funds to a special account set up at a Louisville bank. With each $1,000 donated, we can purchase some 23,000 pencils!

The crucial importance of this project was underscored on Sept. 22, 1994 in Washington, DC when Prime Minister Silajdzic was presented with the Congressional Humanitarian Award, which he accepted in the name of Bosnian children and the Bosnian people who—despite the atrocities committed against them—will not retaliate.

"We have 17,000 children dead," Silajdzic said. "That is hundreds of happy, playful schoolyards swept totally out of existence." For those who have survived, the cataclysm has "taken away their innocence and happy school hours; they mainly spend their days in the basements, in the hospitals, and they have seen so many dead and so much blood that I doubt if there are any Bosnian children left at all. I will mention the gray-haired children of a certain town...but I believe that this award sends a message that they are not forgotten and that we offer them a future."

Haris' comments were echoed by Ambassador Alkalaj, who wrote in appreciation of the "valiant and tireless efforts to alleviate the suffering of the people, especially children, of our country. At times, when we seem to be abandoned by the whole world, the thought that people do care, and help in any way they can, helps us to continue our struggle with hope."

For Americans frustrated by the knowledge that a small effort in the United States could make a huge difference in Bosnia—if only they knew what to do—below is information on one way to help:

How to Help

Pens, pencils, notebooks and other school materials should be sent via mail to:

The Ministry of Education, Attn: Prof. E. Karic, Embassy of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Pantovcak 96, 41000 Zagreb, CROATIA, tel. 385 41 430 031, fax 385 41 441 899, Attn: Ambassador Kasim Trnka, or Attn: Mr. Sefko Omerbasic.

Heavier shipments should be sent via the port of Rijeka, Croatia for collection by Bosnian government trucks. Donors sending material via Rijeka should fax information on the shipment to the Embassy of Bosnia-Herzegovina in Washington at (202) 833-2061 and the Islamic Texts Society at (502) 897-3641 to facilitate collection at the port.

Readers wishing to donate money for the project should transfer funds to: Education-Bosnia, Account No. 272 48802, ABA Routing 083 0000 56, National City Bank, Louisville, KY.