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The chat with Samira Fatma Baručija and Lejla Hasandedic Dapo was held on
February 5, 2022 at 7PM IST. Greshma Pious Raju, Arya Meher, Daniel William and
Khadeejah from Ecopeace Teen Café joined the chat. We were tried to understand the
difficulties faced by people during the war and post war situations. They both shared
the life different ethnic communities who fought each other and saw each other as
enemies. Both speakers were worried about the current situation off Bosnia and
Herzegovina. But they are hopeful that peace can be established in their region with
the efforts of peace heroes.
Samira Fatma Baručija is from Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and works as the
Regional Coordinator for the URI Multiregion. She is a peacebuilder, trying to
facilitate dialog, interfaith work, and reinforce the importance of living together for the
sake of peace and security. Most of her work nowadays is focused on peacebuilding
and creating cultures of peace.. The work that Samira is doing locally is done through
a youth-led, youth-founded organization called Youth for Peace.
Samira mentioned about the life of displaced people and their rehabilitation and readaptation to the societies. As a child, who grown up during the post-war period
actually helped her to overcome the crisis. It also developed critical thinking and also
enabled to deconstruct the prejudices and stereotypes. She believes that dialogue is a
key to fight against discrimination and stereotypes.
Lejla Hasandedic Dapo is a psychologist, psychotherapist, lecturer, activist,
peacebuilder, and volunteer from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Currently she is doing her
PhD in psychology at Ankara Yildirim Beyazit University, in Turkey. She is working
as United Religions Initiative (URI) Europe CC Liaison Officer. She was URI Youth
Ambassador and she is co-founder of Youth for Peace, an organization that positioned
itself as one of the most prominent youth-led organizations in Bosnia and
Herzegovina, working in the field of peacebuilding. She is also a Non-violent
communication trainer, Learning to Live Together (Arigatou International) trainer, she
holds a Diploma in Islamic studies from the University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and
Herzegovina, and she is PPA and KAICIID fellow.
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Lejla shared that all who overcome the war are peace heroes who lead a n extra
ordinary life. She also shared about how United Religion Initiative support her in her
journey of peacebuilding.
Lejla share about her experience in her school where she met students from other side.
She mentioned that she was so curious to meet students and amilies who were their
enemies but she could not have an opportunity meet them due to the post war and
divisions. But she had an opportunity to attend the school were students from both
groups are studied together. From there she came to know about the common interests
among them. That gave her new perspectives and interest.
― Humanitarian aid package as a kid and so he was rejoiced that he got new toys but a
few minutes after that my mom saw him and he took a hammer and he crushed all of
the toys that he got and my mom started like screaming like what did you do and he
was like well this is what cars look like don't they because that's the only card that he
saw around him was crushed burnt and that's the memory that he wanted to recreate
with his toys that's how a normal car looked like to him.‖
While sharing the reflection from a war happened years ago now the human kind
witnessed another war in Ukraine. Children lost their lives and their childhood. May
peace prevail on earth as soon as possible and let‘s rejoice our children in sustaining
peace.