From the Liveblog of
Wednesday, July 8, 2015
Russia vetoes UN resolution calling Srebrenica a genocide
Russia vetoes a UN resolution that would have condemned the 1995 massacre of Muslims at Srebrenica during the Bosnian war as a “crime of genocide,” saying that singling out the Bosnian Serbs for a war crime would create greater division in the Balkans.
Two international courts have called the slaughter by Bosnian Serbs of some 8,000 Muslim men and boys who had sought refuge at what was supposed to be a UN-protected site genocide. But Russia’s UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin objected to focusing only on Srebrenica, stressing that Bosnian Serbs and Croats had also suffered during the 1992-95 war that killed at least 100,000 people.
Britain drafted the resolution to mark the 20th anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre on Tuesday, but the vote was delayed to address Russian concerns.
The defeated resolution states that acceptance of “the tragic events at Srebrenica as genocide is a prerequisite for reconciliation” and “condemns denial of this genocide as hindering efforts towards reconciliation.”
— AP
The Times of Israel Community.