The Bosnian Genocide

According to Fouad Riad, there were “thousands of men executed and buried in mass graves, hundreds of men buried alive, men and women mutilated and slaughtered… (www.hrw.org). The Srebrenica Massacre was only one part of the Bosnian Genocide. The Bosnian Genocide is one of the worst genocides since World War II. With over 100,000 deaths and 8,000 of them related to the massacre of Srebrenica, Bosnia is home to the worst mass killing in Europe since World War II. Despite warning signs though newspaper and media, the international and the U.S. failed to intervene sufficiently.

A good starting place would be after the year of 1980, in which President Josip Broz (also known as Tito) of Yugoslavia died. He was responsible for keeping the country
together. After his death, tensions were reformed amongst ethnic groups of Yugoslavia. In 1987, Slobodan Milosevic became the leader of Serbia, and nationalism increased there (www.ppu.org) He envisioned Yugoslavia as “Greater Serbia” (www.worldwithoutgenocide.org) because he wanted a prominent Serb state. Bosnia and Croatia declared its independence from Yugoslavia in April of 1992, slightly after the end of the Cold War. At the time, Bosnia was primarily made up of Bosniaks, who were Bosnian Muslims. The Serbs did not agree with the Muslims ruling the government, for they believed that they were superior to the Bosniaks. The tension between the Bosnian Muslims and the Serbs reached a boiling point when the Serbs formed an army to overtake the capital of Bosnia. As a result, the Serbs began to execute Bosnian Muslims
There were many methods of torture and killings.
For example, concentration camps and detention camps were used for mass killings of Bosniaks, which is similar to the method of the Nazis during the Holocaust (www.historyplace.com). Women were often raped in order to get pregnant and there were 20,000 rapes within rape camps between 1992 and 1995 (worldwithoutgenocide.org). There were over 200 concentration and detention camps, in which over 100,000 people died due to shootings, horrific living conditions, beatings, and rape. An example of a mass killing would be in the city of Srbrenica in July 1995. According to an interview with Mevludin Oric, “Everyone in the sea of bodies were dead” (www.nbcnews.com). Roughly eight thousand men and boys were dead after the massacre, and it is the worst mass extermination in Europe since World War
II.
The international community didn’t do much to intervene.
The U.N. (United Nations) established 6 safe areas in which the Bosnian Muslims could escape; there were guarded by troops. Despite the safe areas being implemented into Bosnia, it was ineffective as Serb troops were able to destroy the area.
The United States didn’t do much to ease the Bosnian Genocide. Bill Clinton and George Bush chose isolationist policies since they did not want to get involved with conflict despite an unprecedented amount of evidence of mass killings. However, beginning in 1992 the United States began to take action. On August30, 1995, Operation Deliberate Force was put into action; the strikes were primarily aimed at the Serbs (www.nato.int). This eventually led to a peace agreement between the Serbs and Bosnia. On December 14, 1995, the Dayton Accords were signed, which ended conflict in Bosnia. This genocide led to some
changes.
The International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was formed in order to find those who were guilty of crimes against humanity, genocide, breaches of the Geneva Conventions, and violations of war. As of today, there have been 161 indictments in relation to the Bosnian Genocide. Despite justice being done, Bosnia continues to struggle in the world. With an unemployment of over 40 percent, many people have left the country in hopes of better opportunities (worldwithoutgenocide.org). Many places along the countryside are ruined due to the NATO Bombing Campaign around 20 years ago. Although the genocide is over, there are still problems within Bosnia.
The Bosnian Genocide is an atrocity that will go in history for ages. Many hopeless victims died in the hands of the Serbs. More action needs to be taken in possible genocides; as we see time and time again, when the international community does not intervene, many people suffer, and forces will keep destroying an ethnic group until it is gone. It is vital that the international community takes warning sins very serious and not put it to aside. This genocide will not likely be the last in Europe as it keeps occurring in the world. Will this be a lesson learned, or will it be ignored?