page_title: Šahovići massacre
section_title: Massacre
hierarchical_section_title: Šahovići massacre / Massacre
caption_attribution_description: Shqip: Jusuf mehoniqi, kaçak i Sanxhakut
context_page_description: The Šahovići massacre was a massacre of the Muslim population of the Yugoslav village of Šahovići and neighbouring villages in the region of the Lower Kolašin. It was committed on 9 and 10 November 1924 by a mob of 2,000 Orthodox Christian men from Kolašin and Bijelo Polje that sought revenge for the earlier murder of Boško Bošković, governor of the area. The massacre was fueled by rumors which targetted local Muslim, anti-Yugoslav leader Jusuf Mehonjić as the perpetrator. In time, it became known that Bošković was killed by members of a rival clan, the Rovčani. In the aftermath of the massacre many Muslims fled from the region.
context_section_description: Zulfikarpašić concluded that the massacre was committed by armed men from Kolašin and Bijelo Polje who coordinated their attack on Šahovići and Pavino Polje on the 19 km wide frontline. There are different estimates of the number of victims. Some sources estimate 600, while some sources up to 900, all of them emphasizing that many women and children were among victims. Some sources estimate the number of victims to be 3,000. According to the official report, the massacre was committed by villagers from Polja village in Kolašin, members of the brotherhood of the murdered Bošković, who killed 120 Muslims and burned and robbed 45 houses.
  The massacre was described by Milovan Đilas in the book Land without Justice, based on the testimony of his father Nikola, who participated in the massacre. 
  In Shahovichi the authorities informed the vigilantes that a group of Moslems, taken under protective custody on the pretext that their lives were in danger, were being moved to Bjelo Polje. The Montenegrins lay in wait for them in a likely spot, and massacred them near the cemetery of Shahovichi. Some fifty prominent Moslems were killed. . . .What especially upset the established mores was not so much the murders themselves, but the way in which they were carried out. After those prisoners in Sahovici were mowed down, one of our villagers, Sekula, went from corpse to corpse and severed the ligaments at their heels. This is what is done in the village with oxen after they are struck down by a blow of the axe, to keep them from getting up again if they should revive. . . . Babes were taken from the arms of mothers and sisters and slaughtered before their eyes. . . . The beards of the Moslem religious leaders were torn out and crosses were carved into their foreheads. . . .
  — Milovan Đilas, Land without Justice
caption: Jusuf Mehonjić, local rebel
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