Srebrenica massacre (Srebrenica massacre)

On July 11, 1995, near the town of Srebrenica, Bosnian Serb forces killed more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslims. This crime is called the largest genocide in European history since World War II.

A quarter of a century has passed, but it still cannot be said that all those who committed crimes during the bloody civil war of 1992-1995 have been punished. In addition, modern Bosnia and Herzegovina is experiencing a number of problems that call into question the future of the country and the fragile peace established after the war.

The collapse of Yugoslavia in 1991-1992 was accompanied by a series of military conflicts.

While small Slovenia managed to gain independence after 10 days of low-intensity fighting, in which several dozen people died, in Croatia in 1991 a war broke out between the Croatian government and the republic created by the Serbian minority, which was assisted by the Yugoslav army.

However, the bloodiest was the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which began in the spring of 1992.

At that time, 43% of the republic's population was Muslim Bosniaks, 31% were Orthodox Serbs, and 17% were Catholic Croats. The ethnic map of the country resembled a patchwork quilt, as representatives of different nations often lived peacefully in the same village or neighboring towns for many years, forming joint families.

In February 1992, the country held a referendum on independence from Yugoslavia, in which 99% of the population supported it. The turnout was only 63% - ethnic Serbs mostly boycotted it, while Muslims and Croats mostly supported independence.

So, when the first ethnic riots began, the Yugoslav army sided with local Serbian politicians who wanted Bosnia to remain part of a small Yugoslavia. It was tried to be created by Serbian President Slobodan Milošević, involving Bosnia and Montenegro. But if there was a consensus on this in Montenegro, a civil war began in Bosnia, which cost the lives of at least 100 thousand people.

In these events, Bosnian Muslims fought for independence, Croats - first for independence, and then for the idea of joining the areas inhabited by Croats to an independent Croatia, and Serbs - for the accession of the lands inhabited by Serbs to Serbia. Each group tried to establish control over as much territory as possible.

The Bosnian Muslims, as the weakest party in a military sense, who, unlike the Croats and Serbs, were not supported by neighboring states, quickly began to lose territory in the fighting.

The city of Sarajevo, populated mainly by Muslims, found itself under a several-year siege by the Bosnian Serb army, which had settled in the mountains above the city and shelled civilians.

The picturesque Mostar in Herzegovina became the scene of fighting between Bosniaks and Croats, during which the ancient bridge - a symbol of the city - was destroyed.

And the Bosnian Muslims in eastern Bosnia found themselves surrounded by Bosnian Serbs in several enclaves with centers in the cities of Srebrenica, Žepa, and Gorazde.

Serb forces tried to take these enclaves for several years. In 1993, UN peacekeepers were deployed in the Muslim enclaves and declared them safe zones.

In July 1995, the Bosnian Serb army launched Operation Krivaja 95 to capture the Bosnian Muslim enclaves of Srebrenica and Žepa in eastern Bosnia, near the border with Serbia.

About 570 Dutch peacekeepers were stationed in the first enclave, and several dozen Ukrainians in the second.

On July 11, the Bosnian Serb army, which included volunteers from Greece and Russia, overcame the resistance of Bosnian Muslim units and entered Srebrenica. NATO aircraft that had been shelling tanks belonging to Mladić's army had to stop their attacks after he threatened to destroy the Dutch peacekeepers who were in the enclave.

In the nearby village of Potocari, several thousand Bosnian Muslims, mostly women and children, were hiding at a Dutch peacekeepers' base. The Serbs forced the Dutch peacekeepers to hand over to them the men - more than 300 Bosniaks aged 14 to 70, who were hiding at the base. In total, as a result of the operation, Bosnian Serb forces captured several thousand Bosniaks. Over the course of several days, they were taken to remote areas and shot. The bodies were buried in mass graves. On July 17, 1995, a large accumulation of bodies near the Branevo farm and excavators raking them were captured during aerial photography. Having captured Srebrenica, the Bosnian Serb army began preparing to capture the Žepa enclave.

"The Bosnian Serbs showed the complete powerlessness of the UN, and at the same time NATO and the USA. The safety zones absolutely did not justify their name, since the small contingents of peacekeepers from European countries were not able to protect even themselves, let alone Muslims. The Bosnian Serb practice of taking UN peacekeepers hostage demonstrated the general weakness of the UN strategy," US President Bill Clinton recalled those events in his memoirs "My Life". According to him, it was after the Srebrenica massacre that NATO abandoned the "two keys" principle, according to which the UN had the right to veto NATO operations in the country.

In 2003, a memorial to the victims of the genocide was opened in the village of Potocari near Srebrenica with the participation of former US President Bill Clinton. As of 2018, more than 6,600 victims were buried at this memorial cemetery.

Every year, Bosnian Muslims organize the Peace March to Potočari and hold burial ceremonies for the remains of people who continue to be found in the vicinity of Srebrenica.

In 2001, the first person convicted of genocide in the history of the tribunal was General Radislav Krstić, former commander of the Drina Corps of the Bosnian Serb Army. He was the one who commanded the operation to capture Srebrenica. He was found guilty of aiding and abetting genocide and sentenced to 45 years in prison.

In 2010, Colonel Ljubiša Beara, the head of counterintelligence for the Bosnian Serb Army, who visited the sites of mass executions during the events in Srebrenica, was sentenced to life imprisonment.