TEHRAN – Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Saturday that the massacre of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica in July 1995 laid bare Europe’s ineptitude that continues until today and a failure on the part of the United Nations.

25 yrs ago today, #SrebrenicaGenocide began as Europe failed to uphold its basic duties. Quarter of a century later Europe is plagued by same ineptitude.

The failure of the @UN to take any action at the time—to forever haunt the world body—should remain a lesson for the present. pic.twitter.com/UxcbfnLgBF

— Javad Zarif (@JZarif) July 11, 2020

“25 yrs ago today, #SrebrenicaGenocide began as Europe failed to uphold its basic duties. Quarter of a century later Europe is plagued by same ineptitude,” Zarif tweeted.

Zarif made the remarks as Bosnia and Herzegovina commemorated the carnage on Saturday. 

The massacre have stood out as the worst carnage of civilians in Europe since World War II.

During the Bosnian war, Bosnian Serb forces pushed non-Serbs out of territories they sought for their Serb statelet. Fleeing Muslims took shelter in several eastern towns, including Srebrenica, that were designated as United Nations “safe zones”, according to Reuters.

Zarif said, “The failure of the @UN to take any action at the time—to forever haunt the world body—should remain a lesson for the present.” 

On July 11, 1995, the Serb forces commanded by General Ratko Mladic overran Srebrenica, which was protected by lightly armed Dutch peacekeepers. They sent women and children away and captured and executed the men and boys they found. The bodies were dumped into mass graves and later exhumed by UN investigators and used as evidence in war crimes trials of Bosnian Serb leaders.

NA/PA