Thirty years ago, the UN stood and watched a genocide happen
In 1993, the town of Srebrenica, in eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina, was declared a ”safe zone” under the protection of the United Nations. Bosniaks – Bosnian Muslims – had fled there to escape ethnic cleansing by Bosnian Serbs during the war. Yet two years later, Srebrenica saw over 8,000 people killed in the span of a week.
The Bosnian Serb Army had set out to ethnically cleanse Bosniaks in order to create a ”Greater Serbia” with only Serbian citizens. On 11 July, they stormed Srebrenica to exterminate the local population.
Led by general Ratko Mladić, the soldiers separated women from men, including teenage boys and the elderly. While the women and children were transported elsewhere, the boys and men were taken to remote areas to be blindfolded, lined up, and shot.
Where were the UN-sent ”Blue Helmets” when families were separated and people slaughtered? Right there, but powerless. Potential interventions were blocked by vetoes from Russia and China and inaction from the US and NATO. The world watched as Mladić's forces committed genocide.
The UN's failure was confirmed by rulings of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), which officially ruled the mass murder of Bosniaks a genocide. Years later, the Dutch Supreme Court found that Dutch UN peacekeepers in Srebrenica failed in their mission.
Even 30 years later, survivors still search for remains, accountability and recognition in a country where ethnic divisions remain deeply entrenched. The massacre laid bare the limits of UN peacekeeping when mandates are weak and political will is absent. But it also shaped international law, pushing genocide to the forefront of legal and diplomatic frameworks.
For Europe, Srebrenica is both a scar and a lesson: declarations of protection mean little without action, and the promise of ”never again” demands more than words.