30 years on: The Srebrenica genocide explained

DW (English)

Thirty years after the Srebrenica genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina, survivors are still seeking closure. What led to Europe's worst massacre since WWII? Who was responsible? And were the perpetrators brought to justice?

Transcript

00:00There are nearly 7,000 gravestones here.

00:05This is the Srebrenica Potocari Memorial and Cemetery in eastern Bosnia.

00:1030 years ago, in July 1995, this was the site of the worst massacre in Europe since World War II.

00:18More than 8,000 Muslim men and boys were murdered by the army of Republika Srbska,

00:24the Bosnian Serb military force, under the command of General Ratko Mladic.

00:29To this day, many of the victims remain unidentified.

00:33As for the survivors, they are still processing the trauma.

00:37When it was only my generation, we would have been happy,

00:43but my daughters, in fact, live in the hospital.

00:48Whether they want or not, this will be part of their lives.

00:53They live with me, they talk with me.

00:57And, of course, this is something that represents their lives,

01:01which will be determined by their lives.

01:03Not only those, but also their children.

01:06But how could such a massacre have occurred?

01:10And has justice been done?

01:12The Srebrenica genocide happened during the Bosnian War,

01:16the brutal conflict that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia.

01:19Between 1992 and 1995, ethnic tension in Bosnia and Herzegovina turned into violence,

01:27especially between the country's predominantly Orthodox Christian Bosnian Serbs and Muslim Bosniaks.

01:33In 1993, the United Nations declared the town of Srebrenica a safe area.

01:39It was protected by Dutch UN peacekeepers.

01:42Thousands of Bosniak civilians, already suffering from severe hunger, fled to Srebrenica,

01:49hoping they would at least be safe there.

01:52But in early July 1995, Bosnian Serb forces began attacking the town.

01:57On July 11, Srebrenica was overrun.

02:01The Bosnian Serb army demanded that the Bosniak fighters lay down their weapons in exchange for safety.

02:08But it was a deadly trap.

02:12More than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were executed and buried in mass graves.

02:19The UN failed to protect the Bosniaks.

02:22The Netherlands later apologised to the relatives of victims and survivors

02:26for the Dutch peacekeepers' failure to prevent the slaughter.

02:30Years later, in 2001 and 2007 respectively,

02:34the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

02:37and the International Court of Justice ruled that what happened in Srebrenica was genocide.

02:43In other words, it was a deliberate act of killing a large number of people

02:48based on their national, ethnic or religious identity.

02:52The judges tried to return the individual crimes.

02:57In fact, the government was not a bit of a choice in the city.

02:58The country.

02:59The human rights were not a danger.

03:00The human rights were not a theft.

03:01The human rights were not a sacrifice.

03:02The human rights were not a crime.

03:03The human rights were not a crime.

03:04However, all of this in general has not affected the needs of the victims.

03:11So, restorative truth is not in a classic sense of reparation,

03:18but the recognition of what has happened

03:21and the attempt to re-construise your life as much as possible.

03:34Serhat Komladic of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

03:39He is now serving a life sentence in The Hague.

03:43But 30 years later, the pain remains.

03:46Although over 45 people were convicted of crimes relating to the massacre,

03:51several families are still searching for the remains of their loved ones.

03:56More than a thousand victims have not been identified.

04:00The emotional and political wounds caused by this tragedy run deep,

04:04and the scars are still visible.

04:07For many survivors, full justice has not been done.

04:10Serbia and Republika Srpska still deny that what happened in July 1995 was genocide.

04:30.

04:38.

04:40There's a question.

04:42.

04:43.

04:44.

04:49.

04:50.

04:51.

04:53.

04:55.

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