Gornja Maoča

Gornja Maoča
Горња Маоча

Basic data

State :

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Entity :

Federation of BiH

Canton :

Tuzla

Municipality :

Srebrenik

Coordinates :

44 ° 44 ' N , 18 ° 38' E Coordinates: 44 ° 43 '50 " N , 18 ° 37' 41" E

Height :

350 m. i. J.

Residents :

209 (2013)

Gornja Maoča , formerly Karavlasi , is a settlement south of the village (Donja) Maoča in the Majevica Mountains in northeastern Bosnia and Herzegovina . It belongs to the municipality of Srebrenik .

The word Gornja corresponds to the German prefix Ober- in place name, so that the village on a hill can also be called Obermaoča. The neighboring village of Donja Maoča (Untermaoča) is therefore a little below.

history

The former place name refers to the Karavlasi , a common name in Serbia south of the Danube for a certain ethnic group. At the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century, the Rudari , who came from Romania, emigrated to Bosnia , among others. A part of this ethnic group settled above the village of Maoča. They made a living by making and selling wooden products.

In 1944 a "cleanup" was carried out in the village by members of the SS-Handschar division . The residents were driven into a house, shot at, and the house was then set on fire. 25 people died and only three survived injured.

In 1967 a documentary about the Cancari craft was filmed in the village . Directed by Midhat Mutapdžić. It is about the processing of wood into objects of daily use for the rural population. This fifteen-minute film, which was shot in black and white, tells the story of the felling of the trees to the sale in the surrounding communities. Mata , a resident of the village , guides us through the film .

After the Bosnian War , Islamist fighters from Afghanistan and other nations who had fought on the side of the Bosniaks settled there instead of the former Christian residents . In 2010 Gornja Maoča had about 100 inhabitants. This settlement was possible because these fighters married local women during the war and therefore did not have to leave the country after the end of the war.

In February 2010, the village, which was considered a stronghold of radical Islamists, was stormed by around 600 police officers. They dug an arsenal and arrested ten people.

Mevlid Jašarević, who carried out an Islamist attack on the US embassy in Sarajevo with a Kalashnikov AK-47 on October 28, 2011 , had lived temporarily in Gornja Maoča and stayed there in February 2010. After the attack on the embassy, the village was again cordoned off by units of the Bosnian police. Two men were arrested on November 1, 2011, who allegedly drove the suspect to Sarajevo.

In 2015 the village made international headlines again because the IS flag was said to have been hoisted over the town there at the beginning of the year . The Bosnian Salafist leader Nusret Imamović had lived in the Wahhabi village for some time, as had a number of Bosnian IS fighters.