Radovan Karadzic, Sarajevo is not your city, and you have no right to say that it is, just as you do not have the right to say in public, even if it’s in court, that someone has dug up bones around Bosnia and brought them to Srebrenica to make a fake graveyard. This is insulting.
Luther King Son Focuses on Role of Bosnia Youth
Sarajevo | 12 May 2009 |
The visit of the celebrated human rights activist, as well as the upcoming visit of the US Vice President Joseph Biden scheduled for May 18, are broadly seen in Bosnia as signs that the US’s attention is once again zeroing into Bosnia and the rest of the Balkans.
“The White House pays attention to Bosnia and Herzegovina again,” read the front page headline in the Mostar daily Dnevni List on Tuesday.
US ambassador to Bosnia, Charles English, said that the visit of Martin Luther King III has been organised by the US embassy to mark the 55th anniversary of the legal decision that canceled racial segregation in US schools.
The purpose of the trip, during which Martin Luther King III will visit Sarajevo, Tuzla, Banja Luka, Mostar and Stolac, is to promote tolerance, equal rights and justice for all. These are crucial issues for Bosnia which is currently facing its worst political crisis since the end of the 1992-5 war.
“I do not have solutions for problems in Bosnia and Herzegovina. I believe that this country has a future and everything we do today, we should do for the benefit of the young generations that are coming,” Martin Luther King III told journalists during his media event in Sarajevo on Monday afternoon.
His father, Martin Luther King, Jr, was a Baptist minister, activist and prominent leader in the African-American civil rights movement. He led the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957. His efforts led to the 1963 March on Washington, where King delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech. There, he raised public consciousness of the civil rights movement and established himself as one of the greatest orators in U.S. history.
In 1964, King became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to end racial segregation and racial discrimination through civil disobedience and other non-violent means. King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, at the age of 39, in Memphis, Tennessee. He was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977 and Congressional Gold Medal in 2004.
Martin Luther King III, who was ten-years old when his father was assassinated, followed in his father’s steps and became a human rights advocate and community activist himself. He served as the head of his father’s civic organisation the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, from 1997 to 2001.
Later he founded an organisation called Realising the Dream, which he still runs.
During the meeting with journalists, Martin Luther King III stressed the important role youth play in Bosnia and other countries, and added that he wanted to inspire them to engage in political life and bring about needed changes.
He also emphasised the need to resolve disputes through non-violent means.
(reporting by Srecko Latal)
2009-05-12 22:35:28