Bosnia marks 30 years after Srebrenica massacre as cases of genocide continue worldwide

Author: Devin Windelspecht, MSc

July 17, 2025

As the world marks the 30th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide, HRRC calls for a renewed commitment by the international community to act in cases of genocide. It especially calls for members of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to take concrete steps to prevent and mitigate the effects of genocide, ethnic cleansing, or crimes against humanity when they occur.

A Muslim woman visits the Potocari Memorial Center in Srebrenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina. [Image credit: Valdrin Xhemaj/EPA]

In July 1995 during the Bosnian War, thousands of mostly Bosniak (Muslim) Bosnians fled to the besieged town of Srebrenica, which was considered a “safe area” under the protection of the United Nations (U.N.). Over the next few days, Bosnian Serb soldiers massacred over 8,000 Bosniak men and boys, then buried their bodies in mass graves. The massacre was the first recognized genocide –  defined as “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” – in Europe since the Second World War. 

30 years later, Bosnia and Herzegovina is still wrestling with the aftermath of the Srebrenica genocide. Over 1,000 bodies have yet to be identified, and genocide denial – while illegal in Bosnia – is still prevelant, particularly in Republika Srpska, the autonomous and mostly ethnically Serb half of Bosnia that was created as part of the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement and which includes Srebrenica within its borders.

For example, in 2018, the President of the Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, called the genocide an “arranged tragedy,” while last year, thousands of Bosnian Serbs gathered to protest a U.N. resolution commemorating the genocide and denying that genocide has taken place. Meanwhile, in neighboring Serbia, political leaders have attempted to block U.N. resolutions recognizing the massacre as a genocide, with suppport from Russia. 

The 30-year commemoration of the Srebrenica genocide this year follows the 30-year anniversary of the Rwanda genocide in 2024. At the time, they led calls for action by the international community to stop genocides under the idea of “never again,” a phrase originally used in reference to the genocide of Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators during the Holocaust. In 2005, in part in response to the genocides in Srebrenica, Rwanda, and Darfur, the U.N. adopted the "Responsibility to Protect” (R2P), which calls on the international community to act in cases of genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. 

In 2025, despite calls for “never again,” genocide continues. The 2017 genocide against the Rohingya people in Myanmar and the genocide of the Yazidi people carried out in northern Iraq by the Islamic State in 2014 have both been widely considered genocides, while some contemporary conflicts today have also been labeled as genocide or carried out with genocidal intent. Massacres against ethnic minorities in Sudan by the Rapid Response Force (RSF) and mass killings of Palestinians in Gaza by Israel have been labeled by international genocide scholars and international human rights organizations such as Amnesty International as meeting the definitions of genocide. 

The continued prevalence of genocide has been attributed to the rise of hate speech on social media, as well as paralysis by the U.N. due to the veto power of countries like the U.S., Russia and China in the U.N. Security Council. These countries have used their veto to resolutions calling for action to stop genocide and crimes against humanity alleged to have been carried out by Israel, Sudan, and Myanmar, respectively. 

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Glossary 

• Autonomous – a region or state able to politically govern itself largely without influence from the country it is a part of. 

• Bosniaks – a mostly Muslim ethnic group in Bosnia. 

• Bosnian Serb – an ethnically Serb ethnic group in Bosnia. Not to be confused with Serbians, who are ethnic Serbs who are citizens of the neighboring country, Serbia. 

• Commemorate – recognize, in a respectful way. 

• Crimes against humanity – crimes that violate the dignity and human rights of a person as decided by international human rights law. 

• Dayton Peace Agreement – the 1995 peace agreement that ended the Bosnian War and the larger Yugoslav conflict, which involved the present-day nations of Bosnia, Croatia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, and Slovenia, 

• Ethnic cleansing – the attempt to forcibly remove members of an ethnic group from a given location. Distinct from genocide, which is the intent to destroy a given group. 

• Ethnic group – a group belonging to a common cultural background and/or descent. 

• Genocide – an intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a member of an ethnic, religious, political or racial group. Examples include the Holocaust carried out by Nazi Germany and the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. 

• International community – the global community of nations, represented in institutions such as the United Nations. 

• Massacre – an instance of mass violence, usually indiscriminate and against civilians. 

• Paralysis – inability to act. 

• Resolution – a formal statement of the collective opinion of the United Nations. 

• U.N. Security Council – a body of the United Nations tasked with ensuring international security. It has five permanent members – the U.S., U.K., France, Russia and China – and 10 rotating seats of non-permanent members. 

• Veto – in the United Nations, a power by the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council (U.K., U.S., France, Russia and China) to end a resolution by voting against it.

• War crimes – crimes that violate international agreements on the conduct of war, such as the Geneva Conventions.