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The Srebrenica Massacre is the name for one of the most horrific and controversial events in recent European history. It refers to the killing of a large number of Bosniak men and teenage boys in the region of Srebrenica, by the Bosnian Serb army of general Ratko Mladić, who has since been indicted for genocide and various other war crimes. Due to estimated 7,000 victims, it is widely considered the biggest killing in Europe since World War II. Due to the nature of this event the exact numbers, details, and causes of this are debated to this day.

Following the breakup of the Yugoslavia and the war that ensued, Bosnian Serbs took control of most of eastern Bosnia, conducting a campaign of ethnic cleansing against Bosniaks in the region, as documented by thousands of eye witnesses and international organizations. Srebrenica was one of the handful of remaining Bosniak enclaves in that area.

Many Serbs from the outlying areas and the city itself joined the Serbian army at the outset of the conflict, while there is evidence such as video footage, that the Serbian population in the region who were not officially part of the Serbian army, had taken part in the aggression by providing the Serb forces with arms and ammunition, such as mortar shells. Some even independently participated in the attacks, often looting and destroying Bosniak homes.

In 1993, Serb forces launched an overwhelming offensive on the city, forcing its defenders to agree to a UN monitored demilitarization plan, making Srebrenica the first "safe area" of the conflict. Some 600 Dutch Peacekeepers were assigned to safeguard civilians in the city, but soon got involved in the local quagmire. Bosniak forces under Naser Orić were able to keep some of their weapons and many of their trenches behind the borders of the "safe area". Orić used this to his advantage, setting out on numerous night time revenge raids against outlying Serbian villages, including that of Kravica, notoriously raided on January 7th, Orthodox Christmas. These attacks were often followed by a wave of desperate hungry Bosniak civilians, many of whom had been cleansed from their own communities, looting and burning homes and exacting vengeance on the Serbs they caught. Hundreds were brutally killed and injured in these events, with Serb estimates claiming around 2000 casualties.

On June 4, 1995, the commander of United Nations military forces in the former Yugoslavia, Lt. General Bernard Janvier of France, secretly met Mladić to obtain the release of the hostages, more that half of whom were French. Mladić demanded that Janvier first promise there be no future air strikes. Five days later chief UN representative in the region, Takashi Akashi, said that the that the UN would now "Abide strictly by peacekeeping principles".

On July 7 1995, the Bosnian Serb forces led by general Ratko Mladić occupied the enclave. Dutch Peacekeepers requested aerial assistance, but none came, and they were taken as hostages by Serb forces. Orić was gone from Srebrenica by then, and left the command in the hands of his liutenants, prompting some members of the media to accuse the Bosnian forces of not putting up an adequate defense. Most civilians immediatly left for Potoćari, the main base of UN forces, or boarded buses for government held territory. Most of the male population however, including soldiers, older men, and young boys formed a collunm instead and attempted to force their way to Tuzla and Bosnian government held territory.

They were estimated to number about 12,500 in total. In their attempt to escape, they were surrounded by Serb forces who opened fire on them, using anti aircraft cannons and heavy machine guns. Hundreds were killed in the ambush, with many more wounded being systematically executed later on. Those who chose to surrender or were captured were later taken away by Serb forces and executed as well. Serb forces continued to pursue what remained of the group, killing hundreds more until they had escaped to Bosnian government held territory. Many survivors have provided detailed accounts of alleged use of chemical weapons in biological warfare by the Serb forces against the fleeing men, possibly a Benzilate compound, that is said to have rendered it's victims disoriented and hallucinatory. In a November 1998 report titled, "Chemical Warfare in Bosnia? The Strange Experiences of the Srebrenica Survivors", Human Rights Watch concluded that the use of an incapacitating agent "cannot be ruled out" though "conclusive evidence remains elusive".

Due to the nature of these events, mass confusion, and propaganda from both sides, the exact numbers, details, and causes of this are debated to this day. The number of killed in the Srebrenica Massacre is claimed to be as high as 10,000, to as low as 2,000 by the two sides, with some even claiming the massacre never happened at all. Most estimates agree that the exact number is probably somewhere around 7,500, although we may never know for certain. Around 6,000 bodies have thus far been recovered in the Srebrenica region, with only a fraction of these having been identified.

Ratko Mladić and the political leader of Bosnian Serbs Radovan Karadžić have both been indicted for genocide, crimes against humanity and violations of the laws or customs of war at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. In 2001, Radislav Krstić, a Serb commander who had led the assault on Srebrenica alongside Mladić, was convicted by the tribunal on genocide charges and received 46 years to life in prison.

After a long-running discussion about the event in the Netherlands, the Dutch second cabinet of Wim Kok chose to resign in April 2002 after the official inquiry and report by the Nederlands Instituut voor Oorlogsdocumentatie.

The Enclave, a three part series based on the Srebrenica incident, was released in 1995 by the Dutch Public Broadcasting station. It has since been condensed into one movie and is regularly shown on US free satellite channel LinkTV.

In 2004, Dragan Čavić, the president of Republika Srpska acknowledged in a televised address that Serb forces killed several thousand civilians in violation of the international law, and asserted that Srebrenica was a dark chapter in Serb history. As of 2004, the mass graves are still being dug up.

See also: History of Bosnia and Herzegovina, History of Yugoslavia

External links

• Collection of Srebrenica articles, backgrounds and multimedia files
• The Association Women of Srebrenica
• Analysis of the Fall of Srebrenica
• Ibran Mustafić's accusations of Izetbegović's role
• ICTY Indictment against Karadžić and Mladić for Srebrenica
• Articles on Srebrenica
• Mass grave holds Srebrenica victims
• Article excerpts on Srebrenica
• Hundreds of remains found at Bosnia mass grave as exhumation starts
• July 1995 Article
• NIOD Srebrenica website; (English version) - this Dutch organisation made a very large report on the Srebrenica massacre at enormous cost.