Srebrenica massacre commemorations

 

Saturday, 11 July 2009 09:39

 

Bosnia's Muslims are due to mark the anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre, 14 years after Europe's worst atrocity since World War II.

 

The massacre of about 8000 Muslim men and boys by Serbian forces on the 11 July 1995, is to be commemorated for the first time across Europe.

 

The remains of the victims, aged between 14 and 72, were in most cases found in secondary mass graves where they had been moved from initial burial sites in an attempt by Serb leaders to cover up war crimes.

 

In January, the European Parliament proclaimed the date a day of commemoration of the Srebrenica genocide.

 

While they admitted in 2004 that their forces killed 8,000 Srebrenica Muslims, Bosnian Serb authorities condemned the resolution, reflecting the revival of nationalist rhetoric that triggered the country's 1992-1995 war.

 

In another act of defiance last week, Serb deputies in the Bosnian parliament blocked an initiative to declare 11 July the Srebrenica genocide remembrance day in the former Yugoslav republic.

 

The Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic, suspected of being the main architect of the massacre, is awaiting trial before the International Court of Justice.

 

His army chief and co-accused Ratko Mladic is still on the run.

 

Source

 

It's a pretty horrible thing obviously, so I don't really know what to say. But I guess it's good it is being officially commemorated. Thoughts?

Quite why this has taken 14 years to be commemorated is frankly beyond me....

 

This is the worst massacre in Europe since the Holocaust, and we certainly dont forget to commemorate that do we....?

 

But then, of course, we dont exactly do much to commorate the slaughter of over 1 million Rwandans either do we......? -_-

I agree. I think any form of mass-murder should be commemorated by everyone. More effort needs to be made in recognizing and commemorating such events.