The Srebrenica massacre, also known as the Srebrenica genocide, was the July 1995 genocidal killing of more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys in and around the town of Srebrenica during the Bosnian War. It was mainly perpetrated by units of the Bosnian Serb Army of Republika Srpska under Ratko Mladić, though the Serb paramilitary unit Scorpions also participated. In addition, 25,000 to 30,000 Bosniaks, mainly women and children, were abused and forcibly moved out of Srebrenica. The massacre constitutes the first legally recognised genocide in Europe since the end of World War II.
Before the massacre, the United Nations (UN) had declared the besieged enclave of Srebrenica a "safe area" under its protection. A UN Protection Force contingent of 370 lightly armed Dutch soldiers failed to deter the town's capture and subsequent massacre. On 13 July, peacekeepers handed over some 5,000 Muslims sheltering at the Dutch base in exchange for the release of 14 Dutch peacekeepers held by the Bosnian Serbs.
A list of people missing or killed during the massacre contains 8,372 names. The Research and Documentation Center in Sarajevo established that 83% of those killed were civilians. As of 2020, nearly 7,000 genocide victims had been identified through DNA analysis of body parts recovered from mass graves. Some Serbs have claimed the massacre was retaliation for civilian casualties inflicted on Bosnian Serbs by Bosniak soldiers from Srebrenica under the command of Naser Orić. These 'revenge' claims have been rejected and condemned by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the UN.
The Appeals Chamber of the ICTY (in 2004) and the International Court of Justice (in 2007) have ruled the Srebrenica massacre constituted genocide. In 2002, the government of the Netherlands resigned, citing its inability to prevent the massacre. In 2013, 2014 and 2019, the Dutch state was found liable by its supreme court and the Hague district court, of failing to prevent more than 300 deaths. In 2013, Serbian president Tomislav Nikolić apologised for "the crime" of Srebrenica but refused to call it genocide.
In 2005, then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan described the massacre as "a terrible crime – the worst on European soil since the Second World War", and in May 2024, the UN designated 11 July as the annual International Day of Reflection and Commemoration of the 1995 Genocide in Srebrenica.
Background
Conflict in Eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina
The Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina was inhabited by mainly Muslim Bosniaks (44%), Orthodox Serbs (31%) and Catholic Croats (17%). As the former Yugoslavia began to disintegrate, the republic declared national sovereignty in 1991 and held a referendum for independence in February 1992. The result, which favoured independence, was opposed by Bosnian Serb political representatives, who boycotted the referendum. The Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina was formally recognised by the European Community in April 1992 and the United Nations in May 1992.
Following the declaration of independence, Bosnian Serb forces, supported by the Serbian government of Slobodan Milošević and the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA), attacked Bosnia and Herzegovina, to secure and unify the territory under Serb control, and create an ethnically homogenous Serb state of Republika Srpska. In the struggle for territorial control, the non-Serb populations from areas under Serbian control, especially the Bosniak population in eastern Bosnia, near the Serbian borders, were subject to ethnic cleansing.
Ethnic cleansing
Srebrenica, and the surrounding Central Podrinje region, had immense strategic importance to the Bosnian Serb leadership. It was the bridge to disconnected parts of the envisioned ethnic state of Republika Srpska. Capturing Srebrenica and eliminating its Muslim population would also undermine the viability of the Bosnian Muslim state.
In 1991, 73% of the population in Srebrenica were Bosnian Muslims and 25% Bosnian Serbs. Tension between Muslims and Serbs intensified in the early 1990s, as the local Serb population were provided with weapons and military equipment distributed by Serb paramilitary groups, the JNA and the Serb Democratic Party (Srpska demokratska stranka, SDS).
By April 1992, Srebrenica had become isolated by Serb forces. On 17 April, the Bosnian Muslim population was given a 24-hour ultimatum to surrender all weapons and leave town. Srebrenica was briefly captured by the Bosnian Serbs and retaken by Bosnian Muslims on 8 May 1992. Nonetheless, the Bosnian Muslims remained surrounded by Serb forces, and cut off from outlying areas. The Naser Orić trial judgment described the situation:
Between April 1992 and March 1993 ... Srebrenica and the villages in the area held by Bosnian Muslims were constantly subjected to Serb military assaults, including artillery attacks, sniper fire ... occasional bombing from aircraft. Each onslaught followed a similar pattern. Serb soldiers and paramilitaries surrounded a Bosnian Muslim village ... called upon the population to surrender their weapons, and then began with indiscriminate shelling and shooting ... they then entered the village ... expelled or killed the population, who offered no significant resistance, and destroyed their homes ... Srebrenica was subjected to indiscriminate shelling from all directions daily. Potočari, in particular, was a daily target ... because it was a sensitive point in the defence line around Srebrenica. Other Bosnian Muslim settlements were routinely attacked as well. All this resulted in a great number of refugees and casualties.
Between April and June 1992, Bosnian Serb forces, with support from the JNA, destroyed 296 predominantly Bosniak villages around Srebrenica, forcibly uprooted 70,000 Bosniaks from their homes and systematically massacred at least 3,166 Bosniaks, including women, children and elderly. In neighbouring Bratunac, Bosniaks were either killed or forced to flee to Srebrenica, resulting in 1,156 deaths. Thousands of Bosniaks were killed in Foča, Zvornik, Cerska and Snagovo.
1992–1993: Struggle for Srebrenica
Over the remainder of 1992, offensives by Bosnian government forces from Srebrenica increased the area under their control. In July 1992 Bosnian forces attacked neighbouring Serb villages in Srebrenica and Bratunac, killing 69. By January 1993 they had linked with Bosniak-held Žepa to the south and Cerska to the west. The Srebrenica enclave had reached its peak size of 900 square kilometres (350 square miles), though it was never linked to the main area of Bosnian-government controlled land in the west and remained "a vulnerable island amid Serb-controlled territory". Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ARBiH) forces under Naser Orić used Srebrenica as a staging ground to attack neighboring Serb villages inflicting many casualties. In 1993, the Serb village of Kravica was attacked by ARBiH, which resulted in Serb civilian casualties. The resistance to the Serb siege of Srebrenica, by the ARBiH under Orić, was seen as a catalyst for the massacre.
Serbs started persecuting Bosniaks in 1992. Serbian propaganda deemed Bosniak resistance to Serb attacks as a ground for revenge. According to French General Philippe Morillon, Commander of the UN Protection Force (UNPROFOR), in testimony at the ICTY in 2004:
JUDGE ROBINSON: Are you saying, then, General, that what happened in 1995 was a direct reaction to what Naser Oric did to the Serbs two years before?
THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. Yes, Your Honour. I am convinced of that. This doesn't mean to pardon or diminish the responsibility of the people who committed that crime, but I am convinced of that, yes.
Over the next few months, the Serb military captured the villages of Konjević Polje and Cerska, severing the link between Srebrenica and Žepa, and reducing the Srebrenica enclave to 150 square kilometres. Bosniak residents of the outlying areas converged on Srebrenica and its population swelled to between 50,000 and 60,000, about ten times the pre-war population. General Morillon visited Srebrenica in March 1993. The town was overcrowded and siege conditions prevailed. There was almost no running water as the advancing Serb forces had destroyed water supplies; people relied on makeshift generators for electricity. Food, medicine and other essentials were scarce. The conditions rendered Srebrenica a slow death camp. Morillon told panicked residents at a public gathering that the town was under the protection of the UN, and he would never abandon them. During March and April 1993 several thousand Bosniaks were evacuated, under the auspices of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The evacuations were opposed by the Bosnian government in Sarajevo, as contributing to the ethnic cleansing of predominantly Bosniak territory.
The Serb authorities remained intent on capturing the enclave. On 13 April 1993, the Serbs told the UNHCR representatives that they would attack the town within two days unless the Bosniaks surrendered and agreed to be evacuated.
Starvation
With the failure to demilitarize and the shortage of supplies getting in, Orić consolidated his power and controlled the black market. Orić's men began hoarding food, fuel, cigarettes and embezzled money sent by aid agencies to support Muslim orphans. Basic necessities were out of reach for many in Srebrenica due to Orić's actions. UN officials were beginning to lose patience with the ARBiH in Srebrenica and saw them as "criminal gang leaders, pimps and black marketeers".
A former Serb soldier of the "Red Berets" unit described the tactics used to starve and kill the besieged population:
It was almost like a game, a cat-and-mouse hunt. But of course, we greatly outnumbered the Muslims, so in almost all cases, we were the hunters and they were the prey. We needed them to surrender, but how do you get someone to surrender in a war like this? You starve them to death. So very quickly we realised that it wasn't really weapons being smuggled into Srebrenica that we should worry about, but food. They were truly starving in there, so they would send people out to steal cattle or gather crops, and our job was to find and kill them ... No prisoners. Well, yes, if we thought they had useful information, we might keep them alive until we got it out of them, but in the end, no prisoners ... The local people became quite indignant, so sometimes we would keep someone alive to hand over to them [to kill] just to keep them happy.
When British journalist Tony Birtley visited Srebrenica in March 1993, he took footage of civilians starving to death. The Hague Tribunal in the case of Orić concluded:
Bosnian Serb forces controlling the access roads were not allowing international humanitarian aid—most importantly, food and medicine—to reach Srebrenica. As a consequence, there was a constant and serious shortage of food, causing starvation to peak in the winter of 1992/1993. Numerous people died or were in an extremely emaciated state due to malnutrition. Bosnian Muslim fighters and their families, however, were provided with food rations from existing storage facilities. The most disadvantaged group among the Bosnian Muslims was that of the refugees, who usually lived on the streets and without shelter, in freezing temperatures. Only in November and December 1992 did two UN convoys with humanitarian aid reach the enclave, and this despite Bosnian Serb obstruction.
1993–1995: Srebrenica "safe area"
UN Security Council declares Srebrenica a "safe area"
On 16 April 1993, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 819, which demanded "all parties ... treat Srebrenica and its surroundings as a safe area which should be free from any armed attack or ... hostile act". On 18 April, the first group of UNPROFOR troops arrived in Srebrenica. UNPROFOR deployed Canadian troops to protect it as one of five newly established UN "safe areas". UNPROFOR's presence prevented an all-out assault, though skirmishes and mortar attacks continued.
On 8 May 1993, an agreement was reached for demilitarization of Srebrenica. According to a UN report,
General [Sefer] Halilović and General Mladić agreed on measures covering the whole of the Srebrenica enclave and ... Žepa. ... Bosniac forces ... would hand over their weapons, ammunition and mines to UNPROFOR, after which Serb 'heavy weapons and units that constitute a menace to the demilitarised zones ... will be withdrawn.' Unlike the earlier agreement, it stated specifically that Srebrenica was to be considered a 'demilitarised zone', as referred to in the ... Geneva Conventions.
Both parties violated the agreement, though two years of relative stability followed the establishment of the enclave. Lieutenant colonel Thom Karremans (the Dutchbat Commander) testified that his personnel were prevented from returning to the enclave by Serb forces, and that equipment and ammunition were prevented from getting in. Bosniaks in Srebrenica complained of attacks by Serb soldiers, while to the Serbs it appeared Bosnian forces were using the "safe area", as a convenient base to launch counter-offensives and UNPROFOR was failing to prevent it. General Sefer Halilović admitted ARBiH helicopters had flown in violation of the no-fly zone and he had dispatched eight helicopters with ammunition for the 28th Division.
Between 1,000 and 2,000 soldiers from the VRS Drina Corps Brigades were deployed around the enclave, equipped with tanks, armoured vehicles, artillery and mortars. The 28th Mountain Division of the ARBiH in the enclave was neither well organised nor equipped, and lacked a firm command structure and communications system. Some of its soldiers carried old hunting rifles or no weapons, few had proper uniforms.
UN failure to demilitarise
A Security Council mission led by Diego Arria arrived on 25 April 1993 and, in their report to the UN, condemned the Serbs for perpetrating "a slow-motion process of genocide". The mission stated "Serb forces must withdraw to points from which they cannot attack, harass or terrorise the town." Specific instructions from UN Headquarters in New York City stated UNPROFOR should not be too zealous in searching for Bosniak weapons and the Serbs should withdraw their heavy weapons before the Bosniaks disarmed, which the Serbs never did.