On April 12, 2010, five-year-old Mirsada Heldović disappeared from the yard of her family’s home in the Bavči Roma settlement on the outskirts of Kumanovo, North Macedonia. At the time of her disappearance, the child was under the supervision of her grandmother while her parents were at the hospital, as her mother was nine months pregnant and expecting to deliver. Mirsada had been playing in the yard with her twin sister shortly before she went missing. According to the grandmother, the child’s absence was noticed almost immediately, and the family began searching the area and questioning neighbors before reporting the disappearance to the police. She was last seen wearing a red blouse, blue jeans, and black sneakers.The family also noted that Mirsada had developmental disabilities, which heightened their concern that she would have been particularly vulnerable if taken by an unknown individual.

Witnesses in the settlement reported seeing a black jeep with Bulgarian license plates in the area on the day of the disappearance. According to residents, a similar vehicle had been observed circling the settlement in the days prior. This detail gained additional significance because a nearly identical sighting had been reported two weeks earlier in the nearby Sredorek settlement, shortly before the disappearance of another Roma child, four-year-old Dane Memedi. The time and geographic proximity of the two disappearances, combined with the repeated sightings of a foreign-registered vehicle, raised early concerns that the cases could be connected.
The Heldović family expressed dissatisfaction with the initial police response, stating that they and other residents searched through the Bavči and Sredorek areas overnight without police escort or organized support. They also claimed that their request for border closure or heightened monitoring of crossings was not honored, despite the possibility that the child could have been transported out of the country. This concern reflected a broader perception among Roma families in the region that cases involving their missing children were not pursued with the same urgency as cases involving non-Roma communities.

Although early speculation suggested the possibility of accidental disappearance or wandering, the combination of the suspicious vehicle, the rapid nature of the event, and the absence of physical evidence led many to consider child trafficking a potential explanation. The Kumanovo area sits near several international borders—Serbia and Kosovo to the north and Bulgaria further east—making cross-border movement feasible within a short time-frame. If Mirsada was abducted and transported out of Macedonia, the investigation would have required immediate cooperation with multiple jurisdictions, but there is no public record indicating that such coordinated efforts were initiated.

Publicly available information suggests that the investigation yielded little forensic or documentary evidence. No CCTV footage existed in the settlements at the time, and no physical clues (tire tracks, clothing, or confirmed eyewitness identifications) were reported. Today, the disappearance of Mirsada Heldović remains unresolved.

“She was playing in the yard, and suddenly she disappeared. We went to the police, they shrugged their shoulders . . . Now Mirsada should be nine years old. The child was taken and there is no one to help us.”
Си играла во двор, и ја снемало одеднаш. Одиме во полиција тие креваат раменици, ни викаат многу време поминало. Сега Мирсада треба да има девет години. Детето е грабнато, нема кој да ни помогне. 
– Mirsada’s uncle (Link)