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On May 23, the UN General Assembly votes on the resolution on the genocide in Srebrenica

2024-05-15 11:37:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

On May 23, the UN General Assembly votes on the resolution on the genocide in

"The General Assembly of the United Nations will discuss the resolution on Srebrenica on May 23," says the website of this institution. The session will start at 16:00 CET and the adoption of the resolution requires a simple majority vote, meaning 97 of the 193 member states of the United Nations.

In the text of the draft resolution, which "Voice of America" ??has seen, it is stated that "the year 2025 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the genocide in Srebrenica, in which at least 8,372 people lost their lives, thousands were displaced and families and communities were destroyed."

The text states that the General Assembly decides to designate July 11 as the International Day of Reflection and Remembrance of the 1995 Genocide in Srebrenica, to be celebrated annually.

In the text of the Resolution originally proposed by Germany and Rwanda, among other things, any attempt to deny the genocide in Srebrenica and to magnify the figures of those who have been convicted of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide is condemned. It also emphasizes the importance of completing the process of finding and identifying the victims of the genocide in Srebrenica and continuing efforts to bring the perpetrators of this crime to justice.

On July 11, 1995, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Bosnian Serb forces in Srebrenica. The massacre, which took place a week after Srebrenica, which had been declared a safe zone by the United Nations, was attacked by Bosnian Serb forces, has been described as the worst atrocity in Europe since the Second World War.

The former leader of the Bosnian Serbs, Radovan Karadzic, and the military man Ratko Mladic, have been sentenced to life imprisonment by the UN Court for war crimes in the former Yugoslavia, for war crimes and genocide in Srebrenica. Besides them, more than 50 people have been sentenced to more than 700 years of imprisonment for genocide and crimes in that city.

The International Court of Justice confirmed in 2007 that genocide was committed in Srebrenica, also emphasizing that Serbia failed to prevent it.

But Belgrade, which calls the Srebrenica massacre a crime of massive proportions, disputes its designation as genocide. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Monday that he will go to New York to attend the General Assembly meeting.

"I will give them the answer they deserve. Those who do this in New York will have a lot of headaches, while our hearts and souls ache," he said.

Serbia, supported by Russia, has requested the withdrawal of the resolution, stressing that with it the Serbian people would be declared genocidal. Serbia's mission to the UN said in a letter that Belgrade was not advised on the content of the draft resolution which, according to him, causes tensions in the region and divisions among UN members.

In a reaction signed by the permanent representatives of Germany and Rwanda at the United Nations, which has been seen by "Voice of America", it is said that Serbia was repeatedly and explicitly invited to engage in the document.

"Any proposal by Serbia to change the text of the draft resolution would be treated very seriously," the letter states.

The draft resolution, it further states, uses the term "genocide" in a legal context, in accordance with the decisions of the International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the International Court of Justice. It does not target Serbia, a respected member state of this organization, nor does it imply any collective guilt towards states, entities or groups".

According to the signatories of the letter, the resolution aims at unification and not division, while calling on all UN member states to support it "thus sending a strong message of remembrance and against denial of the genocide".

EU: There is no place in the bloc for genocide deniers

The European Union said that the question of whether or not there was genocide in Srebrenica is not a matter of opinion, but of the decision of international judicial bodies, and anyone who tries to question it has no place in Europe.

European Union spokesman Peter Stano said on Tuesday that the bloc "will not tolerate anyone among its member states who tries to deny and relativize genocide, or who tries to glorify war criminals, and this is a message that we convey to them. all countries that wish to become members of the European Union. We expect all political actors in the Western Balkans to refrain from any actions and rhetoric that could question their aspirations and that could be seen as a denial of the terrible events that happened in Srebrenica".

Although the resolutions of the General Assembly of the United Nations are not binding, they are interpreted as documents with political weight and reflect the views of the member countries of that mechanism on the issues included in the approved resolutions./ VOA