A GROUP of 14 pupils from Blackburn’s Witton Park Academy are making a four-day visit to Bosnia to raise awareness of the Srebrinica massacre.

They were among 30 teenagers from the school who attended an event at Blackburn Cathedral in July last year when four mothers of victims of the slaughter of more than 8,000 Bosnian men and boys in 1995 told their stories.

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The 30 prefects were so moved they resolved to not let the genocide be forgotten.

Since then several of the Witton Park students have spoken at other schools to raise awareness of the killings of Bosnian Muslims by Serb soldiers.

They now plan to lobby Blackburn with Darwen Council, new MP for the town Kate Hollern and the cathedral for an annual memorial event in the borough.

The 14 16-year-olds studying for their GCSEs set off on Sunday for Bosnian captial Sarajevo and Srenbenica itself led by head of Religious Education Justin Smith.

The 38-year-old said: “When we went to the cathedral the students were very moved.

“Now I am taking 14 of them, from all cultural and religious backgrounds, out to Srebenica to see for themselves where it happened and speak to more local people.

“The idea came from the Year 11 students themselves.”

On Sunday they arrive in Sarajevo and have a guided tour before visiting graveyards and human rights organisations on Monday.

On Tuesday they held for Srebenica itself to visit the Potocari Memorial Centre land meet memorial curator and survivor Hasan Hasanovic before meeting more bereaved mothers and touring the cemetery where many of the victims are buried.

They return on Wednesday to Blackburn.

Blackburn Cathedral dialogue development office Anjum Anwar, who organised the July event attended by pupils from several schools, said:”This is fantastic news.”