tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/bosnian-war-37515/articlesBosnian war – The Conversation2023-05-26T16:22:07Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2053552023-05-26T16:22:07Z2023-05-26T16:22:07ZPeter Howson: new retrospective reveals how Scots painter found redemption after Bosnian war<p><a href="https://www.flowersgallery.com/artists/167-peter-howson/">Peter Howson’s</a> story is one of seeking dignity in human suffering and violence, and finding redemption; it is also uniquely Scottish. <a href="https://www.edinburghmuseums.org.uk/whats-on/when-apple-ripens-peter-howson-65">When The Apple Ripens</a>, Howson’s retrospective at Edinburgh City Arts Centre (27 May-1 October), is a timely showcase to celebrate his 65th year.</p>
<p>The exhibition covers three key stages of his life: the early works of portraiture and recording of the aftermath of <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22079683">Thatcherite Britain</a>; the impact of his <a href="http://www.hasta-standrews.com/features/2017/12/5/peter-howson-and-the-bosnian-war">experiences in Bosnia and Kosovo</a>; and finally, his therapeutic <a href="https://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/10023/21712/Froelich_Peter_Howson_and_The_Language_of_Salvation.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">conversion to Christianity</a> after years of battling with alcoholism and drugs.</p>
<p>Howson studied fine art at Glasgow School of Art (GSA) under the tutelage of head of painting and printmaking, <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/artists/alexander-sandy-moffat">Sandy Moffat</a>, in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Moffat was responsible for promoting Howson and his contemporaries <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/features/steven-campbell">Steven Campbell</a>, <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/artists/adrian-wiszniewski">Adrian Wiszniewski</a> and <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/artists/ken-currie">Ken Currie</a> – the “<a href="https://www.lyonandturnbull.com/news/article/bold-figures/">New Glasgow Boys</a>” – who all worked in the GSA classic style of figurative art. Each created narrative paintings based on detailed explorations of realistic characters, but often with exaggerated forms.</p>
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<h2>A Scottish sensibility</h2>
<p>An unmistakably Scottish feature of Howson’s work is the undertone of <a href="https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/sbet/19-2_195.pdf">Calvinism</a> with its God-fearing, joyless culture of toil and penitence.</p>
<p>His unique perspective on the world reflects his experiences of living in the east end of Glasgow. Most of his early work portrayed caricatures of rough, masculine men with exaggerated musculature. In the paintings of the marginalised homeless, such as <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/613">The Heroic Dosser</a> (1987), and others living and working in his neighbourhood, his subjects are imbued with a sense of nobility.</p>
<p>At the heart of his art practice, he explores the extremes of the human condition. He demonstrates empathy, acceptance and respect for worthy subjects, but he has also created works of satire, mockery and derision, attacking the evils of the world. </p>
<p>His artworks are often focused on the dark psyche of the masculine with its capacity to be brutal, violent and destructive, such as <a href="https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/saturday-night-at-glencorse-56566/search/keyword:peter-howson/page/3">Saturday Night at Glencorse</a> (1985). They contain a sense of escalating foreboding and menace. He reserves a particular anger for the inhumanity of the jingoistic far right as can be seen in Psycho Squad (1989) and <a href="https://peterhowson.co.uk/the-blind-leading-the-blind/patriots/">Patriots</a> (1991).</p>
<p>His work often has dark messages contained within, of impending doom, violence and thuggery, with brandished weapons and pitbull terriers. Howson hates bigotry and <a href="https://www.actiononsectarianism.info/children/about-sectarianism/what-is-sectarianism#:%7E:text=In%20Scotland%2C%20the%20word%20sectarianism,can%20lead%20to%20serious%20violence.">sectarianism</a> in all its forms and has sought to use his art to bring all faiths together.</p>
<p>The numerous drumming and dancing characters in his work resonate with the controversial <a href="https://www.theglasgowstory.com/image/?inum=TGSA05149">marching season</a> in Glasgow (and Norther Ireland). Protestants affiliated with the unionist and loyalist <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-18769781">Orange Order</a> celebrate historical victories over Catholics in Ireland with marching band parades over the summer. </p>
<p>Howson has always opposed fascism and stands against the rise of the far right in Europe, believing it is one of his life’s works to highlight the effects that these beliefs have on people through his art. At a time when Margaret Thatcher was in power, he called out the right-wing extremists and portrayed the dispossessed with dignity.</p>
<h2>War and peace</h2>
<p>With an obsession around violence and warfare, Howson applied and was <a href="https://www.theartnewspaper.com/1993/06/01/british-war-artist-peter-howson-sent-to-bosnia">commissioned by the Imperial War Museum</a> to record the <a href="https://www.hmd.org.uk/learn-about-the-holocaust-and-genocides/bosnia/the-bosnian-war/">Bosnian civil war</a> in 1993 as the official war artist. He was sent to capture its ugly destructive truth, and encountered death, brutality, annihilation of communities, ethnic cleansing and traumatised refugees, as can be seen in <a href="https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/cleansed-6059/search/keyword:peter-howson/page/3/view_as/grid">Cleansed</a> and <a href="https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/bosnian-harvest-46886">Bosnian Harvest</a> (both 1994), and Barrier Sunset (1995). </p>
<p>For Howson, life is about violence and confrontation, and in his words, encountering it makes him “feel alive”. But the war had a huge impact on Howson’s mental health and his personal relationships were damaged by his experiences.</p>
<p>On his return, after a period of convalescence, he produced 300 pieces of powerful, shocking and controversial works of art. Influenced by <a href="https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/artists/francisco-de-goya">Goya</a>, <a href="https://www.moma.org/artists/1559">Otto Dix</a> and <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/paul-nash-1690">Paul Nash</a>, these works detailed the atrocities and landscapes of devastation he had witnessed. This cathartic output had a cleansing effect on his psyche, and he believed these artworks saved his artistic life.</p>
<p>In coping with his ongoing drug and alcohol addictions, Howson sought out religion as a refuge in therapy which helped give him new purpose. His more recent work has been set around the exploration of strong mythological, Christian and biblical themes.</p>
<p>He explores various aspects of Christ’s life and suffering, he imagines portraits of the apostles, scenes of the crucifixion, the stations of the cross and conjures images of old testament figures, such as Job (2011) and <a href="https://www.artnet.com/artists/peter-howson/terah-father-of-abraham-nw3Sy_5CSE15fq5Z1GswPQ2">Abraham</a>.</p>
<p>Themes of death are explored through Greek mythology, set around journeys through the rivers leading to the underworld, such as Phlegethon (2021). There are similarities (Prophecy, 2016) to the dark works of <a href="https://www.artnews.com/feature/hieronymus-bosch-life-early-works-best-paintings-1202685134/">Hieronymus Bosch</a> whose dreamscapes conjured hell and judgement day. Howson claimed in one interview that he aspires to produce works as sublime as those created by renaissance masters <a href="https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/durr/hd_durr.htm">Albrecht Dürer</a> and <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Giovanni-Bellini-Italian-painter">Giovanni Bellini</a>.</p>
<p>Howson’s work is deeply informed by his experience of growing up in Scotland and all he was exposed to and witnessed in Glasgow. It is also characteristic of the painters who came out of the 1980s Scottish art scene, whose styles reflected an ambivalence about <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/p/postmodernism#:%7E:text=Postmodernism%20can%20be%20seen%20as,decades%20of%20the%20twentieth%20century.">postmodernism</a>.</p>
<p>Even though this was <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/p/post-painterly-abstraction#:%7E:text=Post%2Dpainterly%20abstraction%20is%20a,Tate">post-abstract expressionism</a> and well into the era of <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/c/conceptual-art">conceptual art</a>, many Scottish fine artists of that time, even though most trained at the prestigious GSA, seemed to be stuck in more traditional approaches to portraiture.</p>
<p>Howson’s work has a similar style to other contemporary Scottish artists such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-john-byrne-is-one-of-scotlands-greatest-artists-186961">John Byrne</a>, <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/artists/john-bellany">John Bellany</a> and <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/artists/alasdair-gray">Alasdair Gray</a> in which he paints the human form often in cartoonish and caricaturic style. Many of the Scottish artists of the time painted with a modernist, illustrative style of storytelling. </p>
<p>Howson’s purpose and dedication to his craft and artisanship are evident, but it is his moving display of human suffering and his pursuit of redemption which mark him out as one of the greatest contemporary British artists.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205355/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Blane Savage does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Painting with renewed purpose at 65, Peter Howson has overcome his demons to take his place as one of Britain’s leading contemporary artists.Blane Savage, Lecturer in Creative Media Practice and New Media Art, University of the West of ScotlandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1807452022-04-13T16:50:25Z2022-04-13T16:50:25ZBosnia-Herzegovina could be the next site of Russian-fuelled conflict<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457726/original/file-20220412-10836-xt4jo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C66%2C4970%2C3176&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Bosnian Serbs march carrying a giant Serbian flag in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Jan. 9, 2022. The country's Serbs celebrated an outlawed holiday with a provocative parade showcasing armored vehicles, police helicopters and law enforcement officers with rifles.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/bosnia-herzegovina-could-be-the-next-site-of-russian-fuelled-conflict" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>International politics is usually discussed in terms of historical periods associated with specific characteristics — think Cold War adversaries, <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/254418">wars fought for ostensibly humanitarian reasons in the 1990s</a> or the focus on terrorism and state-building during the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/24/lesson-afghanistan-war-on-terror-not-work">War on Terror</a>. </p>
<p>For many, including the United States government, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine marks the beginning of a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cold-war-russia-china-ukraine-america-nuclear-scarier-foreign-policy-2022-3">new period</a> of superpower showdowns. We’ve entered a world where large, militarily powerful states will wrestle for influence, recognition and control over what they see as important elements of the international system. </p>
<p>Thinking in categories, however, hides the fact that international politics unfolds cumulatively. Simmering tensions and outdated political agreements often create the conditions for future conflict. Including today.</p>
<p>Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is tied to the history of both states and the ongoing conflict that followed the annexation of Crimea in 2014. For many, the current war is a continuation and escalation of an existing conflict.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-short-history-of-ukrainian-nationalism-and-its-tumultuous-relationship-with-russia-179346">A short history of Ukrainian nationalism — and its tumultuous relationship with Russia</a>
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<p>But there are other places where Russia could use either political or military might to expand its influence. </p>
<p>Rather than see Russian actions in Ukraine as unique, we need to remember there’s a wider context within which <a href="https://eng.globalaffairs.ru/articles/russias-foreign-policy-in-a-historical-perspective/">Russia will work to achieve its goals</a>. Regardless of what comes of the war in Ukraine, there are other places that Russia might be eyeing.</p>
<h2>Bosnia-Herzegovina at risk?</h2>
<p>Bosnia-Herzegovina is by far the most important example. The <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/bosnia-dodik-cvijanovic-uk-sanctions/31797542.html">Republika Srpska</a>, a Serb province within Bosnia created at the end of <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Bosnian-War">the Bosnian War</a>, celebrated its 30th anniversary on Jan. 9, 2022. The province’s leadership has pushed for increased autonomy and perhaps even independence.</p>
<p>The looming Ukraine crisis overshadowed this, but the tensions are related. Russia’s ambassador to Bosnia-Herzegovina, <a href="https://hr.n1info.com/english/news/russia-ambassador-bosnia-can-join-nato-but-moscow-will-react-to-threat/">Igor Kalbukhov</a>, and Serbia’s prime minister, Ana Brnabic, <a href="https://www.intellinews.com/bosnian-serbs-celebrate-unconstitutional-republika-srpska-day-231238/">attended events to commemorate the anniversary together.</a></p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A dark-haired woman in a turtleneck and suit jacket speaks" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457725/original/file-20220412-13-pwakd8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic speaks during a news conference in Belgrade, Serbia, in March 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic)</span></span>
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<p>Bosnia-Herzegovina and Ukraine are connected because both are places where Russia believes it can achieve its desire to be recognized as a global force. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/60477712">In Ukraine</a> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/education/2010/oct/12/georgia-teaches-english-over-russian">and Georgia</a>, Russia has ostensibly fought for Russian speakers. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, Russia’s <a href="https://natoassociation.ca/keys-to-understanding-russias-relationship-with-serbia/">historical ties</a> to the Serbs — due to their shared Slavic and Orthodox heritage and their alliances during the First and Second World Wars — provide a similar justification.</p>
<p>The Dayton accords, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/from-the-archive-blog/2020/nov/18/the-dayton-accords-a-peace-agreement-for-bosnia-archive-1995">the treaty that ended the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1995</a>, is showing its age, and the outcome of that war could now play a role in another competition between Russia and the West. </p>
<p>Peace was celebrated at the time, but has proven to be a failure. War between ethnic groups ended and a loose federal government was created, but actual reconciliation between <a href="https://www.e-ir.info/2015/02/25/peace-and-reconciliation-in-the-balkans-croatia-vs-serbia/">Serbs, Croatians</a> <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/bosnia-unravelling-serbs-separatists/31542689.html">and Bosnians did not ensue</a>. </p>
<p>This means that Russia could claim it must use its power to protect a subjugated ethnic group. Like Russian speakers in Ukraine and Georgia, Serb political demands could become a pretext for Russian action.</p>
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<img alt="An elderly man rides his bike past the burnt out wreckage of a bus and cars." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/458010/original/file-20220413-18-qrig04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/458010/original/file-20220413-18-qrig04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458010/original/file-20220413-18-qrig04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458010/original/file-20220413-18-qrig04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458010/original/file-20220413-18-qrig04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458010/original/file-20220413-18-qrig04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458010/original/file-20220413-18-qrig04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A Sarajevo resident cycles past the wreckage of burnt-out vehicles damaged in fighting in Sarajevo in 1992.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Santiago Lyon)</span></span>
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<h2>Non-existent state-building</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022381611000831">Ethnicity plays an important role</a> in Bosnian politics because people think of their needs, challenges and opportunities in ethnic terms. </p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/053901847401300407">State-building</a> — the process states go through as they create the systems and institutions that allow them to serve their population — has been limited, leaving people to lean on ethnic parties for support. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/bosnias-endless-crisis-could-be-solved-by-letting-it-break-apart-peacefully-173051">Bosnia's endless crisis could be solved by letting it break apart peacefully</a>
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<p>Bosnia’s failure means two things. Civil conflict spilling over Bosnia’s borders could re-emerge if tensions rise, and Russia could align its goal of exerting further influence on European politics with Serb calls for self-determination. Given Bosnia’s position on the European Union’s flank, this poses a security risk for the EU.</p>
<p>In short, Russia has a <a href="https://www.fpri.org/article/2022/03/securing-and-protecting-bosnia-amidst-russias-invasion-of-ukraine/">ready-made situation</a> that allows it to use diplomatic, political or even military power to further its efforts to compete against western influence. </p>
<p>This could involve increased political or economic support for Bosnian Serbs, support for Serb forces should conflict break out or even conducting a military operation labelled as “peacekeeping.” This final possibility is actually what Russia argued it was doing <a href="https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/the-2008-russo-georgian-war-putins-green-light/">when it invaded Georgia in 2008.</a></p>
<p>The stakes are high. <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2012/04/20-years-since-the-bosnian-war/100278/">Bosnia’s last civil war</a> resulted in 100,000 people killed and nearly <a href="https://www.icrc.org/en/doc/resources/documents/article/other/57jreh.htm">2.5 million people displaced</a>, either inside the country or forced to flee as refugees. </p>
<p>This humanitarian catastrophe occurred during a time when the international community was relatively unified behind the United States and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/nejo.12300">Americans were able to pressure the various parties into reaching a settlement at Dayton</a>. Unquestioned American dominance is not the case today.</p>
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<img alt="A woman with a scarf on her head walks in a cemetery among a sea of white gravestones." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457727/original/file-20220412-23-djmkmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457727/original/file-20220412-23-djmkmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457727/original/file-20220412-23-djmkmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457727/original/file-20220412-23-djmkmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457727/original/file-20220412-23-djmkmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457727/original/file-20220412-23-djmkmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457727/original/file-20220412-23-djmkmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">In this 2016 photo, a Bosnian woman walks among gravestones at Memorial Centre Potocari near Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina, where many of those who died in the 1992-95 war are buried.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Amel Emric)</span></span>
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<h2>Difficult to manage</h2>
<p>Conflicts like the one in Ukraine or a potential conflict in Bosnia occur at the seams between areas that great powers influence. </p>
<p>This means they are not easily managed short of escalation to all-out war. Globally, another world war seems to be the only thing that competing powers share an interest in avoiding. For Ukrainians, and perhaps Bosnians, this means that while the West and Russia may compete over them, they will simultaneously seek to avoid direct conflict with one another. That can create protracted and interminable regional wars.</p>
<p>Direct intervention is not the answer — state-building is. If we want to stabilize our world and prevent the types of atrocities we are seeing every day in Ukraine, the work must be done now. It will not be easy, <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-afghanistan-is-and-isnt-vietnam-all-over-again-166455">as past failures indicate</a>, but only by attempting to solve the quagmire that is state-building can we hope to avoid these tragedies in the future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/180745/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Russia’s future influence on global affairs may not be limited to Ukraine — it may run through Bosnia-Herzegovina. To understand why, we need to think about how past conflicts shape today’s politics.James Horncastle, Assistant Professor and Edward and Emily McWhinney Professor in International Relations, Simon Fraser UniversityJack Adam MacLennan, Assistant Professor of Political Science and Graduate Program Director for National Security Studies, Park UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1802942022-04-05T19:41:33Z2022-04-05T19:41:33ZUkrainian refugees might not return home, even long after the war eventually ends<p>Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has caused more than <a href="https://data2.unhcr.org/en/situations/ukraine">4.2 million people</a> to flee to the <a href="https://data2.unhcr.org/en/situations/ukraine">neighboring countries</a> of Poland, Romania, Moldova and elsewhere. </p>
<p>Russia’s violence against civilians and attacks on cities caused an additional <a href="https://data.humdata.org/dataset/ukraine-key-figures-2022">6.5 million or more people</a> to become internally displaced. They left their homes but moved within Ukraine to other areas where they hope to be safer. </p>
<p>Russia and Ukraine have been holding <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/29/world/europe/peace-talks-russia-ukraine.html">sporadic peace talks</a>. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on April 4, 2022, that <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60987350">talks will continue</a> despite Russian soldiers’ committing mass murders of civilians in Bucha, Ukraine. </p>
<p>But there is no guarantee that the millions of displaced Ukrainians will want to go back to their homes even once the war eventually ends. </p>
<p>Lessons learned from the experiences of people displaced in other conflicts, like Bosnia and Afghanistan, provide insight into what might happen with Ukrainians at the end of the fighting. A wave of new social science research, <a href="https://www.press.umich.edu/12333154/peace_preference_and_property">including my own</a> as a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=_ZTigjcAAAAJ&hl=en">political scientist</a> studying post-conflict settings, shows that once violence ends, people do not always choose to return home. </p>
<h2>Time matters</h2>
<p>Several factors affect people’s choice to return to the place they fled, or to resettle elsewhere. Time is perhaps the most important. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.press.umich.edu/12333154/peace_preference_and_property">Research shows</a> that generations raised in places of refuge may no longer want to return to the place that was once home.</p>
<p>The faster the Ukrainian conflict is resolved, the more likely it will be that refugees will repatriate or return home. </p>
<p>Over time, displaced people adapt to their changed circumstances. In the best case, they form new social networks and get work opportunities in their places of refuge. </p>
<p>But if governments legally stop refugees from seeking formal employment, their prospects for financial self-sufficiency are grim. </p>
<p>This is the situation in some countries with large refugee populations such as <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/04/04/bangladesh-new-restrictions-rohingya-camps#">Bangladesh</a>, where Rohingya refugees from Myanmar are forced to live in camps and are prohibited from working. </p>
<p>This would not be the reality for most Ukrainian refugees, however. Most of them are resettling in the European Union, where they can get a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/21/business/refugees-ukraine-jobs.html">special temporary protected status</a> that enables them to work, attend school and receive medical care for at least one and up to three years. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Children surround an adult in a classroom, all seated, with a rainbow flag hanging on a wall." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456236/original/file-20220404-22605-qhjube.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ukrainian children are seen during their first day at school in Ederveen, Netherlands, on April 4, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/photos/ukrainian-children-are-seen-during-their-first-day-at-school-in-on-picture-id1239739197?s=2048x2048">Robin Van Lonkhuijsen/ANP/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A larger refugee crisis</h2>
<p>Ukrainians add to the growing numbers of people who are forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/may/20/climate-disasters-caused-more-internal-displacement-than-war-in-2020">conflict or climate disasters</a>. </p>
<p>In 2020, the last year with reported global statistics, there were <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/flagship-reports/globaltrends/">82.4 million forcibly displaced people</a> worldwide, the highest figure in the past 20 years. Refugees, people who cross an international border seeking safety, make up 32% of that number. Internally displaced people are 58% of this total figure. The remainder are asylum seekers and Venezuelans displaced without legal recognition abroad. </p>
<p>There are three reasons for the increase in forcibly displaced people.</p>
<p>First, there are unresolved, persistent conflicts in both Afghanistan and Somalia that continue to force people to move. </p>
<p>The withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan in 2021 caused the latest mass <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/afghanistan.html">movement of refugees</a>.</p>
<p>A second cause of rising displacement is the recent start of conflicts in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/ethiopia-tigray-conflict-explained.html">Ethiopia</a>, <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/myanmar-history-coup-military-rule-ethnic-conflict-rohingya">Myanmar</a>, <a href="https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/horn-africa/south-sudan">South Sudan</a> and elsewhere. </p>
<p>Third, fewer people caught up in war are returning home once the violence ends. The average length of time refugees stay away from their homes is <a href="https://blogs.worldbank.org/dev4peace/2019-update-how-long-do-refugees-stay-exile-find-out-beware-averages">five years</a>, but averages can be misleading. </p>
<p>For those 5 million to 7 million people in situations of protracted displacement – more than five years – the average duration of exile is <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/26622897">21.2 years</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman and man sit in front of two young children in a tent, next to a large heater." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456390/original/file-20220405-27-d26z7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A family of Syrian refugees tries to keep warm in a tent in the Beqqa Valley, Lebanon, in January 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/photos/january-2022-lebanon-beqaa-valley-a-syrian-refugee-family-gather-near-picture-id1237855942?s=2048x2048">Marwan Naamani/picture alliance via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Deciding to go home – or not</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdv004">A recent study</a> of Sri Lankan refugee children raised in India because of the Sri Lankan Civil War from 1983 to 2009 found that some prefer staying in India, even though they are not citizens. <a href="https://www.fmreview.org/sites/fmr/files/FMRdownloads/en/return/valcarcelsilvela.pdf">These youths</a> feel they could better integrate in India if they were not labeled as refugees.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.refworld.org/pdfid/52401bea4.pdf">Some studies</a> have shown that experiences of violence in people’s home countries diminishes their desire to return home. Other <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055421000344">recent surveys</a> of Syrian refugees in Lebanon show the opposite. These studies found that those who were exposed to violence in Syria – and had a sense of attachment to home – were more likely to want to return. </p>
<p>Age and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12382">attachment to home</a> that often comes with it also influence people’s desire to return to their home country, making it more likely that older people will return. </p>
<p>Interestingly, this is also the case in some natural disasters. <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11111-009-0092-2">After Hurricane Katrina</a> forced people to leave New Orleans in 2005, only half of adult residents under 40 later returned to the city. That’s compared with two-thirds of those over 40 who chose to go home.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An older Black man sits in a seat drinking from a mug, in a dilapidated looking room with exposed wooden beams and walls." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456386/original/file-20220405-14-e9z19m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Willi Lee, 79, returned to New Orleans and tried to rebuild his home following Hurricane Katrina.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/photos/willi-lee-sits-inside-his-home-which-he-wants-to-rebuild-that-was-by-picture-id71054000?s=2048x2048">Mario Tama/Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Rebuilding</h2>
<p>Rebuilding houses, returning property that has been occupied by others and providing compensation for property losses during war are vital to <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Land-and-Post-Conflict-Peacebuilding/Unruh-Williams/p/book/9781849712316">encouraging people to return home</a> after displacement. </p>
<p>This work is typically funded by the post-conflict government or international organizations like the World Bank and United Nations. People need places to live and are more likely to remain in places of refuge if they have no home to which they can return. </p>
<p>There are exceptions to this rule. Following ethnic conflicts, refugees and internally displaced people were unwilling to return to homes in ethnically mixed neighborhoods when peace returned in both <a href="https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199730360.001.0001/acprof-9780199730360">Bosnia</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12500">Lebanon</a>. They preferred to live in new communities, where they could be surrounded by people of their own ethnicity. </p>
<h2>Not just about peace</h2>
<p>Finally, it is not just peace, but political control that matters to people considering a return. </p>
<p>Nearly <a href="https://www.unicef.org/appeals/syrian-refugees">5.7 million Syrian refugees</a> remain in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and other countries after more than 11 years of war in their country. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad <a href="https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/insights/28041/the-syria-civil-war-might-be-ending-but-the-crisis-will-live-on">has retained political power</a>, and some parts of Syria have not seen active conflict since 2018. But it is still not safe for these refugees to return to live in Syria. </p>
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<p>The economic situation in the <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/syria/overview#1">country is dire</a>. Assad’s government and related militias still conduct <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/10/20/our-lives-are-death/syrian-refugee-returns-lebanon-and-jordan">kidnappings, torture and extrajudicial killings</a>.</p>
<p>Even if Russia retreats and pulls its forces entirely out of Ukraine, some ethnic Russians who were living in Ukraine before the conflict are less likely to return there. Returns are <a href="http://cup.columbia.edu/book/no-return-no-refuge/9780231153362">most likely</a> when the government and returnees are happy with the outcome and people are going back to their own country. </p>
<p>Russian violence in Ukraine has changed the fuzzy division between ethnic Russians and ethnic Ukrainians into a bright line. The comfortable coexistence of the two groups within Ukraine is unlikely to resume.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/180294/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sandra Joireman receives funding from the University of Richmond, the Fulbright program and the Earhart Foundation. </span></em></p>Even once the war in Ukraine ends, the millions of people who fled from their homes might not be quick to return. The faster the war ends, the more likely it is they will go back.Sandra Joireman, Weinstein Chair of International Studies, Professor of Political Science, University of RichmondLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1411772020-07-08T12:17:05Z2020-07-08T12:17:05ZSrebrenica, 25 years later: Lessons from the massacre that ended the Bosnian conflict and unmasked a genocide<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345841/original/file-20200706-3992-1dz43r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3598%2C1726&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Bosnia's memorial cemetery of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, which is still receiving new remains as more genocide victims are identified. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/bosnian-muslim-woman-prays-near-graves-of-her-relatives-at-news-photo/1155046846?adppopup=true">Elvis Barukcic/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Europe’s worst massacre since World War II occurred 25 years ago this July. From July 11 to 19, in 1995, <a href="https://www.icty.org/x/file/Outreach/view_from_hague/jit_srebrenica_en.pdf">Bosnian Serb forces murdered 7,000 to 8,000 Muslim men and boys</a> in the Bosnian city of Srebrenica. </p>
<p>The Srebrenica massacre occurred two years after the United Nations had designated the city to be a “safe area” for civilians fleeing fighting between Bosnian government and separatist Serb forces, during the breakup of Yugoslavia. </p>
<p>Some <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/1995/10/15/fall-srebrenica-and-failure-un-peacekeeping/bosnia-and-herzegovina">20,000 refugees and 37,000 residents</a> sheltered in the city, protected by fewer than 500 lightly armed international peacekeepers. <a href="https://balkaninsight.com/2019/08/08/it-was-hell-dutch-troops-recall-failure-to-stop-srebrenica-deaths/">After overwhelming the UN troops</a>, Serb forces carried out what was later documented to be a carefully planned act of genocide. </p>
<p>Bosnian-Serb soldiers and police <a href="https://undocs.org/A/54/549">rounded up men and boys ages 16 to 60</a> – nearly all of them <a href="https://www.icty.org/x/file/Outreach/view_from_hague/jit_srebrenica_en.pdf">innocent civilians</a> – trucked them to killing sites to be shot and buried them in mass graves. Serbian forces bused about <a href="https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-prevention/countries/bosnia-herzegovina/srebrenica/violence/systematic-executions">20,000 women and children</a> to the safety of Muslim-held areas – but only after raping <a href="https://balkaninsight.com/2010/07/08/silence-and-shame-shield-srebrenica-rapists-from-justice/">many of the women</a>. The atrocity was so heinous, that even the reluctant United States felt compelled to intervene directly in – and finally end – Bosnia’s conflict. </p>
<p>Srebrenica is a cautionary tale about what <a href="https://depaul.digication.com/tom_mockaitis1/Publications">extremist nationalism can lead to</a>. With xenophobia, nationalist parties and ethnic conflict resurgent worldwide, the lessons from Bosnia could not be timelier. </p>
<h2>Perpetrators must be held accountable</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/314449/the-bosnia-list-by-kenan-trebincevic-and-susan-shapiro/">Bosnia’s civil war</a> was a complex religious and ethnic conflict. On one side were Bosnian Muslims and Roman Catholic Bosnian Croats, who had both voted for independence from Yugoslavia. They were fighting the Bosnian Serbs, who had seceded to form their own republic and sought to expel everyone else from their new territory.</p>
<p>The carnage that ensued is epitomized by one street in one town I visited in 1996, as part of <a href="https://depaul.digication.com/tom_mockaitis1/Publications">my study of the Bosnian conflict</a>. In Bosanska Krupa, I saw a Catholic church, a mosque and an Orthodox church on a narrow stretch of road, all left in ruins by the war. Fighters had targeted not only ethnic groups but also the symbols of their identities. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345846/original/file-20200706-4008-19g7jf7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bosnia’s conflict was part of the Yugoslavian Civil War, which destroyed a nation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/civil-war-in-yugoslavia-news-photo/539998516?adppopup=true">David Brauchli/Sygma via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It took more than two decades to bring those responsible for the atrocities of the Bosnian civil war to justice. Ultimately, the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia, a <a href="https://www.icty.org">UN court that ran from 1993 to 2017</a>, <a href="https://www.icty.org/sid/24">convicted 62 Bosnian Serbs of war crimes</a>, including several high ranking officers. </p>
<p>It found Bosnian Serb Army Commander General Ratko Mladić guilty of “<a href="https://www.icty.org/x/cases/mladic/cis/en/cis_mladic_en.pdf">genocide and persecution, extermination, murder, and the inhumane act of forcible transfer in the area of Srebrenica</a>” and convicted Bosnian Serb <a href="https://www.icty.org/x/cases/karadzic/acjug/en/130711_judgement_summary_rule98bis.pdf">leader Radovan Karadžić of genocide</a>. The tribunal also indicted Yugoslav President Slobodan Miloŝević on charges of <a href="https://www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_milosevic/ind/en/mil-ii011122e.htm">“genocide, crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Convention, and violations of the laws or customs of war</a>” for his role in supporting ethnic cleansing, but he died during his trial. </p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>Though many other people have never been tried, the criminal indictments that followed Srebrenica show why the perpetrators of wartime atrocities must be held accountable, <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/17/former-auschwitz-guard-sentenced-to-five-years-in-prison/">no matter how long it takes</a>. Criminal convictions provide some closure for victims’ families and remind the guilty they can never be certain of escaping justice. </p>
<p>It also emphasizes that guilty individuals must be held accountable after war – not entire populations. “The Serbs” didn’t commit genocide. Members of the Bosnian Serb Army and Serbian paramilitaries, led by men like Mladić, did the killing.</p>
<h2>Denialism is dangerous</h2>
<p>Despite the landmark international convictions and painstaking documentation of the crimes against humanity that occurred in Bosnia, some in Serbia <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/07/srebrenica-massacre-bosnia-anniversary-denial/398846/">still claim</a> the genocide never happened. </p>
<p>Using arguments similar to those made by deniers of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/17/world/europe/turkeys-century-of-denial-about-an-armenian-genocide.html">Armenian genocide</a> and <a href="https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/background-and-overview-of-holocaust-denial">the Holocaust</a>, Serbian nationalists insist the number of dead is exaggerated, the victims were combatants, or that Srebrenica is but one of many atrocities committed by all parties to the conflict. </p>
<p>During wartime, it is true, belligerents on both sides will do terrible things. But evidence from Bosnia clearly demonstrates that Serb forces killed more civilians than combatants from other groups. <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20164302?seq=1">At least 26,582 civilians died</a> during the war: 22,225 Muslims, 986 Croats and 2,130 Serbs. Muslims made up <a href="https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-prevention/countries/bosnia-herzegovina/case-study/background/1992-1995">only about 44% of Bosnia’s population</a> but 80% of the dead. <a href="https://www.icty.org/sid/24">The Hague tribunal convicted only five Bosnian Muslims of war crimes</a>.</p>
<p>In 2013, the president of Serbia apologized for the “crime” of Srebrenica, but <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-22297089#:%7E:text=Serbia's%20President%2C%20Tomislav%20Nikolic%2C%20has,up%20of%20Yugoslavia%2C%20including%20Srebrenica.&text=He%20was%20criticised%20after%20his,was%20no%20genocide%20in%20Srebrenica.%22">refused to acknowledge that it was part of a genocidal campaign</a> against Bosnian Muslims.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345843/original/file-20200706-4008-18ruwj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A funeral for 175 newly identified victims of the Srebrenica massacre, July 11, 2014.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/anniversary-of-the-slaughter-of-srebrenica-bosnia-where-news-photo/524306738?adppopup=true">NurPhoto/Corbis via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Indifference is complicity</h2>
<p>Srebrenica is a stark warning that any effort to divide people into “them” and “us” is cause for grave concern – and, potentially, for international action. Research shows that genocide starts with <a href="https://www.genocidewatch.com/ten-stages-of-genocide">stigmatization of others and, if unchecked, can proceed through dehumanization to extermination</a>.</p>
<p>Srebrenica was the culminating event in a yearslong campaign of genocide against Bosnian Muslims. In 1994, over a year before the massacre, <a href="https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6aa2138.html">the U.S. Department of State</a> reported that Serb forces were “ethnically cleansing” areas, using murder and rape as tools of war and razing villages. </p>
<p>But the Clinton administration, fresh from a humiliating failure to stop a civil war in Somalia, wanted to avoid involvement. And the United Nations refused to authorize more robust action to halt Serb aggression, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1999/11/16/world/un-details-its-failure-to-stop-95-bosnia-massacre.html">believing it needed to remain neutral for political reasons</a>. It took the slaughter in Srebrenica to persuade these international powers to intervene. </p>
<p>Acting sooner could have saved lives. In my 1999 book, “<a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/911e/99accb514df2bd51103281d0c83af4c6b6aa.pdf">Peacekeeping and Intrastate Conflict</a>,” I argued that only a heavily armed force with a clear mandate to halt aggression can end a civil war. </p>
<p>The U.S. and UN could have supplied that force, but they dithered. </p>
<h2>Massacres continue</h2>
<p>Remembering past genocides like Srebenica will not prevent future ones. Marginalized groups have been brutally persecuted in the years since 1995, including in <a href="https://www.jww.org/conflict-areas/sudan/darfur/">Sudan</a>, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/11/whats-happening-syria-is-genocide/">Syria</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/14/6700-rohingya-muslims-killed-in-attacks-in-myanmar-says-medecins-sans-frontieres">Myanmar</a>. Today, the Uighurs – a Muslim minority in China – are being rounded up, thrown into Chinese concentration camps <a href="https://apnews.com/269b3de1af34e17c1941a514f78d764c">and forcibly sterilized</a>.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, remembrance of past atrocities is critically important. It allows people to pause and reflect, to honor the dead, to celebrate what unites humanity, and to work together to overcome their differences. Remembering also preserves the integrity of the past against those who would revise history for their own ends. </p>
<p>In that sense, commemorating Srebrenica 25 years later may, in some small measure, make us more willing to resist the evil of mass murder going forward.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/141177/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Mockaitis received a USIP grant in 1995 to fund research on the book "Peacekeeping and Intrastate Conflict: The Sword or the Olive Branch?" (Praeger, 1999), which has a chapter on the Bosnian Conflict. Some small DePaul grants and paid leave also supported his book project.</span></em></p>In July 1995, Serb forces murdered at least 7,000 Bosnian Muslims – an act so heinous it forced the US and UN to intervene in Bosnia’s war. What has the world learned since then about ethnic violence?Tom Mockaitis, Professor of History, DePaul UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1292622020-01-27T20:03:43Z2020-01-27T20:03:43ZPeter Handke Nobel Prize controversy: Literature can’t be judged on esthetics alone<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/308692/original/file-20200106-123403-1u8g8x3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=2892%2C550%2C2667%2C3150&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Demonstrators protest the awarding of the 2019 Nobel literature prize to Peter Handke in Stockholm, in December 2019.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Stina Stjernkvist/TT News Agency via AP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Austrian writer <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/2019/summary/">Peter Handke</a> received the 2019 Nobel Prize in literature. The award is for “<a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/facts/facts-on-the-nobel-prize-in-literature">a writer’s life work</a>,” and Handke has written novels, travelogues, theatre plays, screenplays and poetry. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.thelocal.se/20191211/hundreds-protest-in-stockholm-as-austrian-writer-receives-nobel-prize">Hundreds protested</a> the award ceremony at the Stockholm Concert Hall. This was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/dec/10/protests-grow-ahead-of-nobel-prize-ceremony-for-peter-handke">not an isolated protest</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/308694/original/file-20200106-123399-1cs5d6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/308694/original/file-20200106-123399-1cs5d6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=627&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/308694/original/file-20200106-123399-1cs5d6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=627&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/308694/original/file-20200106-123399-1cs5d6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=627&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/308694/original/file-20200106-123399-1cs5d6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/308694/original/file-20200106-123399-1cs5d6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/308694/original/file-20200106-123399-1cs5d6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Literature laureate 2019 Peter Handke gives his speech during the Nobel banquet at Stockholm City Hall, on Dec. 10, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Anders Wiklund/TT News Agency via AP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The announcement of the award generated public uproar.</p>
<p>Handke’s critics say some of his published work has <a href="https://theintercept.com/2019/10/10/congratulations-nobel-committee-you-just-gave-the-literature-prize-to-a-genocide-apologist/">advanced and fuelled genocide apologetics</a> and they point to his choice to speak at the 2006 funeral of <a href="https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/02/09/peter-handke-stranger-in-love/">Serbian ethno-nationalist politician Slobodan Milošević</a>. When Milošević died, he was on trial facing 66 charges including for <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news2/background/balkans/milosevic_timeline.html">crimes against humanity and genocide</a>.</p>
<p>The controversy has spurred long-standing debates about where stories come from, who is responsible for them and what it means as a writer to bear witness to truth — and also, which persons or institutions have the authority to do so.</p>
<p>These events unfolded at a time of <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/11/30/how-europes-nationalists-became-internationalists/">rising ethnonationalism</a> across Europe.</p>
<h2>Sustained dissent</h2>
<p>Handke’s controversial book, <em><a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=YjJcAAAAMAAJ&q=A+Journey+to+the+Rivers:+Justice+for+Serbia&dq=A+Journey+to+the+Rivers:+Justice+for+Serbia&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiCoJzRuoPnAhUSx1kKHerlAWUQ6AEIKDAA">A Journey to the Rivers: Justice for Serbia</a></em> (translated <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3319.Eine_winterliche_Reise_zu_den_Fl_ssen_Donau_Save_Morawa_und_Drina_oder_Gerechtigkeit_f_r_Serbien?rating=2">from German</a>), attracted <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1997-01-12-bk-17740-story.html">particular</a> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/1999/apr/21/features11.g28">criticism</a>. </p>
<p>The publisher of the English-language 1997 translation describes the book on its jacket as both a “sensitive and nuanced meditative travelogue through Serbia,” and a “scathing criticism of western war reporting.”</p>
<p>In the book, Handke writes: “<a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=YjJcAAAAMAAJ&q=A+Journey+to+the+Rivers:+Justice+for+Serbia&dq=A+Journey+to+the+Rivers:+Justice+for+Serbia&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiCoJzRuoPnAhUSx1kKHerlAWUQ6AEIKDAA">all too many of the reporters on Bosnia and on the war there … are not only proud chroniclers, but false ones</a>.” In his search for a “common remembering” he writes: “To record the evil facts, that’s good. But something else is needed for a peace, something not less important than the facts.” </p>
<p>Handke’s Nobel nomination particularly inflamed journalists and survivors of the Srebrenica genocide, where <a href="https://www.icty.org/en/outreach/documentaries/srebrenica-genocide-no-room-for-denial">more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys</a> were killed in July 1995, during the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-warcrimes-karadzic-bosnia/timeline-what-happened-during-the-war-in-bosnia-idUSL2164446420080721">1992-95 war in Bosnia</a>. Various <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/10/10/peter-handke-won-nobel-his-great-artistry-critics-say-hes-an-apologist-genocide/">intellectuals</a>, as well as the broader public voiced their dissent about Handke receiving the award on Twitter following the award announcement. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1204047540745846784"}"></div></p>
<p>The bigger context is that <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/why-did-ratko-mladic-commit-genocide-against-bosnias-muslims?verso=true">some perpetrators denied</a> findings of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (sometimes referred to as the Hague Tribunal, based in The Hague, Netherlands) — and the tribunal documented atrocious strategies to conceal crimes, such as moving mass graves. Denials of the Srebrenica genocide <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/07/srebrenica-massacre-bosnia-anniversary-denial/398846/">continue today</a>. </p>
<p>Media reported that Emir Suljagić, a survivor of the Srebrenica genocide who wrote <em><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/jul/03/biography.features">Postcards from the Grave</a></em>, said after the announcement of Handke’s award: “<a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/12/09/protest-boycotts-austrian-author-accused-supporting-milosevic/">I am in Stockholm to protest the award being given to a man who negates my suffering and the suffering of so many others</a>.”</p>
<p>During a press conference in December, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/dec/06/peter-handke-questions-nobel-prize-literature-milosevic">Handke did not provide direct answers to questions about the controversy</a>.</p>
<h2>Committee and academy defend decision</h2>
<p>In an Oct. 10, 2019, press release, the Swedish Academy announced it had awarded Handke the Nobel for “<a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/uploads/2019/10/press-literature2018-2019.pdf">an influential work that with linguistic ingenuity has explored the periphery and the specificity of human experience</a>.” </p>
<p>Following the protests and uproar, both Swedish Academy and Nobel Committee for Literature members <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/21/swedish-academy-defends-peter-handkes-controversial-nobel-win">defended the decision</a>. </p>
<p>Two academy members wrote in a Swedish newspaper that Handke had “<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50099218">definitely made provocative, inappropriate and unclear statements on political issues</a>,” but added: “The Swedish Academy has obviously not intended to reward a war criminal and denier of war crimes or genocide.”</p>
<p>In an op-ed, writing as an <a href="https://www.svd.se/forsvarar-valet-handke-en-radikalt-opolitisk-forfattare">individual</a>, one of the members of the committee said Handke in his writing was “<a href="https://artdaily.cc/news/117692/Nobel-Committee-member-defends-Handke-pick#.XgT2Fy2ZPKY">radically unpolitical</a>,” according to a story from Agence France-Presse. British Broadcasting Corp. reported that another member said: “When we give the award to Handke, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50099218">we argue that the task of literature is other than to confirm and reproduce what society’s central view believes is morally right</a>.” </p>
<p>Suhrkamp Verlag, Handke’s publisher, <a href="https://theintercept.com/2019/11/09/peter-handke-won-the-nobel-prize-then-his-publisher-quietly-circulated-a-strange-defense-of-his-genocide-denialism/">circulated a defence of his work following the controversy</a>, but did not release it publicly, journalist Peter Maass wrote in The Intercept.</p>
<p>Many statements in defence of the award echo earlier French and British 20th century literary criticism. </p>
<h2>Evaluating the text’s language alone?</h2>
<p>The French philosopher Roland Barthes’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2010/jan/13/death-of-the-author">influential 1967 essay</a> “<a href="https://books.google.ca/books/about/Image_Music_Text.html?id=U_8yYj9h7aIC&redir_esc=y">The Death of the Author</a>” served to elevate literary work and its language. Barthes wrote: “It is language which speaks, not the author.” </p>
<p>For French philosopher Michel Foucault, the author is a kind of scribe who commits language to paper. The implication is that the author is writing down the realities of the world outside. In his view, “the function of the author is to characterize the existence, circulation and operation of certain discourses within a society” — meaning, ideas and messaging, as he elaborated in his 1969 essay “<a href="https://www.open.edu/openlearn/ocw/pluginfile.php/624849/mod_resource/content/1/a840_1_michel_foucault.pdf">What is an Author?</a>” </p>
<p>Before them, T.S. Eliot <a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/69400/tradition-and-the-individual-talent">proclaimed</a> in 1919 that writing “is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality.” </p>
<p>As feminist literary scholar Cheryl Walker <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/448546">has noted</a>, independence-of-the-text critiques have to a certain extent helped “liberate the text for multiple uses,” like re-reading canonical texts from critical feminist perspectives. </p>
<p>But such critiques have also been at odds with literary traditions on the margins. </p>
<p>Historically, the significance of lived personal and collective experiences have been central features of texts by women, Black, Indigenous and people of colour, queer or transgender writers. </p>
<p>These literatures, their readers and their institutions of criticism have long resisted calls to separate author, text and political or social impact.
They have have asserted either that <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=kE3ek_-FGWgC&printsec=frontcover&dq=inauthor:%22Audre+Lorde%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjThP2RlvDmAhWQJzQIHWDwCNEQ6AEINzAC#v=onepage&q&f=false">the personal is political</a> or that perspective is situational — and rejected the <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=0j2fBgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=This+Bridge+Called+My+Back:+Writings+by+Radical+Women+of+Color&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj-xLPl1PDmAhXVoFsKHZZvCDkQ6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q&f=false">notion that literary work can considered unpolitical.</a> </p>
<h2>Award fuelled ethnonationalist politics</h2>
<p>Critics of Handke’s receipt of the Nobel award challenge the notion that Handke’s literary work can be evaluated apart from its political implications.</p>
<p>Bosnian-American author Aleksandar Hemon has questioned what he calls the academy’s belief in a “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/15/opinion/peter-handke-nobel-bosnia-genocide.html">literature safe from the infelicities of history and actualities of human life and death</a>.” </p>
<p>PEN America issued a statement decrying the academy’s support for Handke, saying the body is “<a href="https://pen.org/press-release/statement-nobel-prize-for-literature-2019/">dumbfounded by the selection of a writer who has used his public voice to undercut historical truth and offer public succor to perpetrators of genocide</a>.” </p>
<p>Among the alarming developments in the Handke affair has been the news <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/18/peter-handke-nobel-prize-genocide-deniers">that the award fuelled far-right ethnonationalist</a> sympathies. </p>
<p>How or if the Swedish Academy will respond to these developments as the public demands it approach the award more cautiously remains to be seen. It seems unlikely that it will rescind Handke’s award. </p>
<p>But the academy is implicated in this affair no matter what.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/129262/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ervin Malakaj does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Controversy surrounding the awarding of the 2019 Nobel Prize in literature spurs a long-standing debate about the meaning of authorship and literature with new urgency.Ervin Malakaj, Assistant Professor of German Studies, University of British ColumbiaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/984232018-08-06T08:52:42Z2018-08-06T08:52:42ZColombia’s troubled peace process and the lessons of Bosnia-Herzegovina<p>Colombia’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/colombia-elects-a-conservative-who-promises-to-correct-its-peace-accord-98273">recent presidential election</a> proved that the polarisation that marked the 2016 referendum on the peace agreement with the FARC is still at work. As they did in the plebiscite, the country’s left and right-wing politicians respectively asked the electorate to accept or reject the agreement – and the ultimate winner was a right-wing sceptic of the deal, Ivan Duque.</p>
<p>Throughout the campaign and since his victory, Duque has insisted he will try to adjust the peace agreement in accordance with the No campaign’s platform in the 2016 plebiscite. Among his pledges are to make sure that crimes related to drug trafficking will not be given amnesty, to revise the transitional justice arrangements to primarily focus on guerrilla members responsible for atrocities, and to keep guerrilla members from participating in politics before serving time in jail. He has also suggested that members of the armed forces be exempt from the transitional justice system.</p>
<p>Duque’s victory was therefore greeted with worry around the world. People <a href="https://www.dur.ac.uk/sgia/about/events/?eventno=38711">were – and are – concerned</a> about what his presidency might mean, not just for the peace accords, but for Colombia’s long-term future. But this is not an unprecedented problem; states and societies transitioning from conflict to peace very often face deep political challenges.</p>
<p>The questions Colombia faces today also confronted Bosnia-Herzegovina in the 1990s after the end of a devastating war that claimed thousands of lives. In the <a href="https://www.osce.org/odihr/elections/bih/13615?download=true">first elections after the accords</a>, the population voted for the former wartime leaders, further entrenching ethnic segregation; in the end, the Dayton Accords ended up institutionalising ethnic division as <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17502977.2012.655614">part of the constitution</a>.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, many members of the elites who helped drive the war were not prosecuted, and have continued to run businesses <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/27800359.pdf?casa_token=zLHpCqn76vEAAAAA:3FtY69YXriA_n-e1bNIS0clIlyzbQAGX5P382EXJc3ZnfeWNudHvXJynOKK8kUjimQY2suz4DPeGhFoNzfDIf4R8DavxahLwn1s6lTMyyC0cv4ukZDCb">from privileged positions of authority</a>. This approach to the transition from war to peace has essentially frozen the structures of war rather than breaking them down – and plenty of <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Peacebuilding-and-Spatial-Transformation-Peace-Space-and-Place/Bjorkdahl-Kappler-Galtung/p/book/9781138924154">deep geographical and political segregation</a> persists to this day.</p>
<p>While Colombia’s 50-year conflict was not divided along ethnic lines, the parallels between these two troubled peace processes are uncomfortably close. Just as in the Bosnian case, the structures of separation that underpinned Colombia’s conflict for five decades might outlast the war’s official end. If Duque is serious in his intentions, the process might be narrowed to focus principally on atrocities committed by guerrilla forces, with crimes associated with the state and its allies taken off the agenda.</p>
<h2>Fear and failure</h2>
<p>Post-conflict transitions are <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13533310802485617">often driven by people’s fears</a> of losing rights, jobs or physical security. It is these very fears that may lead people to vote in favour of ethnic leaders or actors, more generally, who claim to prioritise security over other concerns. When peace agreements are not able to allay such fears, they risk being rejected, undermining hopes for a future where people’s identities as “victims” and “perpetrators” can start to be be broken down.</p>
<p>The effect on victims can be severe. When the general mood is focused on stabilising the logics and structures that underpin a conflict, there is no space to discuss compensation. Restorative justice tends to sink down the agenda, and those affected most by violence and trauma are often the last to be heard. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, this meant that <a href="https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-bosnia-war-reparations/bosnian-war-victims-despair-at-court-fines-over-reparations-claims-idUKKCN1GE0VB">some never received reparations</a>, and many who did only received them <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/30/bosnia-victims-compensation-landmark-ruling">decades after the crimes were committed</a>.</p>
<p>It remains to be seen whether Colombia will be able to handle this challenge differently. Its Comprehensive System for Truth, Justice, Reparation and Non-Repetition has been designed as a restorative justice mechanism, tasked with <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Truth-Justice-and-Reconciliation-in-Colombia-Transitioning-from-Violence/Diaz-Pabon/p/book/9781857438659">attending to the needs of victims</a>. By focusing on reparation, it purports to empower the victims of the conflict.</p>
<p>This approach has been praised for specifically giving attention to women and ethnic minorities, facilitating their representation in the transitional justice process. Thanks to a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-colombia-peace/colombia-peace-deal-cannot-be-modified-for-12-years-court-rules-idUSKBN1CH0BQ">recent ruling</a> by Colombia’s Constitutional Court, making any substantive changes to the terms of the Havana Accords will be difficult. But there are still plenty of ways for those in power to throw the transitional justice process off balance, whether by delaying its implementation or simply limiting the supply of funds.</p>
<p>As in the Bosnian case, Colombia faces the risk that its hard-won peace mechanisms could be co-opted for political ends. If that happens, the country’s political and economic polarisation will only become deeper entrenched – and the needs of its civilians will never be fully met.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98423/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stefanie Kappler receives funding from Riksbankens Jubileumsfond and the Swedish Research Council. She has previously received funding from the ESRC, the AHRC and the British Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Louis Monroy-Santander has previously received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)</span></em></p>Post-conflict processes are often slowed down or even halted by fear. Can Colombia buck the trend?Stefanie Kappler, Associate Professor in Conflict Resolution and Peace Building, Durham UniversityLouis Monroy-Santander, Teaching Fellow in Defence, Development and Diplomacy, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/991222018-07-11T12:31:34Z2018-07-11T12:31:34ZRemembering Srebrenica, more than 20 years on<p>One of the darkest hours in recent human history, the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, has plenty of unpleasant parallels in today’s world, from <a href="https://theconversation.com/syrias-latest-chemical-massacre-demands-a-global-response-94668">Syria</a> to <a href="https://theconversation.com/rohingya-crisis-this-is-what-genocide-looks-like-83924">Myanmar</a>. 23 years after the massacre in and around the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica, remembrance of what has been <a href="http://www.icty.org/en/press/radovan-karadzic-and-ratko-mladic-accused-genocide-following-take-over-srebrenica">described</a> as “scenes from hell, written on the darkest pages of human history” is as important as ever.</p>
<p>The events in and around Srebrenica between July 10-19 1995 are well known. In those few days, an estimated 8,000 Muslim Bosniaks were murdered by Bosnian Serb forces. Efforts to find, recover, identify and repatriate the victims’ remains are ongoing – and the task is a hugely complex one.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.euronews.com/2017/07/11/srebrenica-massacre-commemorated-with-burial-of-recently-identified-bodies">Every year</a> at the <a href="https://www.srebrenica.org.uk/lessons-from-srebrenica/srebrenica-potocari-memorial/">Srebrenica-Potočari Memorial Centre and Cemetery</a>, more victims are laid to rest. This year, <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/sarajevo-honours-convoy-carrying-srebrenica-dead-07-09-2018">35 people</a> have been identified and will be buried. Of the 430 Srebrenica-related sites where human remains have been recovered, 94 are graves and 336 are surface sites with human remains scattered on the ground. Pathologists and anthropologists examined more than 17,000 sets of human remains related to Srebrenica, resulting in around 7,000 identifications, most of them via DNA. To gather enough DNA to make those identifications, more than 20,000 DNA samples had to be collected. </p>
<h2>Slow justice</h2>
<p>It was only in autumn 2017 that Ratko Mladić, a former general of the Bosnian Serb forces, was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/22/ratko-mladic-convicted-of-genocide-and-war-crimes-at-un-tribunal">convicted</a> of the crimes that took place in Srebrenica – genocide and persecution, extermination, murder, and the inhumane act of forcible transfer. Mladić is one of relatively few defendants to have appeared before the <a href="http://www.icty.org/">International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia</a> (ICTY) charged with genocide. </p>
<p>This is because for a conviction on the grounds of genocide, the prosecution has to prove a catalogue of things. To be convicted of the crime of genocide, the accused must have <a href="http://www.icty.org/x/file/Legal%20Library/Statute/statute_sept09_en.pdf">deliberately intended</a> “to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group as such”. Punishable under Article 4(3) of the ICTY Statute are also conspiracy to commit genocide, incitement to commit genocide, attempts to commit genocide and complicity in genocide. Two things have to be proven: the <em>actus reus</em> (the actual killings, serious bodily or mental harm and deliberate infliction of conditions designed to bring about the destruction of the group) and the <em>mens rea</em> (the specific intent to destroy the group).</p>
<p>Mladić’s 2017 conviction did not bring an end to all aspects of his case. In March 2018, both the defence and prosecution <a href="http://jrad.unmict.org/webdrawer/webdrawer.dll/webdrawer/search/rec&sm_recnbr&sm_ncontents=mict-13-56&sm_created&sm_fulltext&sort1=rs_datecreated&count&rows=100">filed their notices of appeal</a>. Though not in relation to Srebrenica, the prosecution submits that the trial chamber erred in two of its findings: first, that Bosnian Muslims in the areas of Foča, Kotor Varoš, Prijedor, Sanski Most and Vlasenica did not constitute a substantial part of the Bosnian Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and second, that Mladić (and others) did not intend to destroy those Bosnian Muslims. As a result, the <a href="http://www.unmict.org/en/cases/mict-13-56">proceedings</a> are ongoing.</p>
<p>During the 530 days of Mladić’s original trial, 377 witnesses appeared in court, some of them victims of war crimes. Victims often have <a href="http://eprints.bournemouth.ac.uk/24977/">many needs</a>: to tell their stories, to contribute to public knowledge and accountability, to publicly denounce the wrongs that were committed against them and others, to bear witness on behalf of those who did not survive, and to receive reparations, public acknowledgement or apologies. They may wish to confront the accused, to find out the truth about what happened to their loved ones, to contribute to peace goals or to help prevent the perpetration of further abuse. Many risk their own personal safety to tell their stories, or those of victims who did not survive.</p>
<p>And yet, a recent <a href="https://www.impunitywatch.org/docs/Keeping_the_Promise_%5BFINAL%5D.pdf">report by international NGO Impunity Watch</a> paints a bleak picture stating that “Western Balkan states have done very poorly when it comes to victim participation in [transitional justice] processes. Victims’ voices are marginalised and their rightful claims have been politicised by the different sides.”</p>
<h2>Remembrance and responsibility</h2>
<p>Impunity Watch describes a continuing “battleground of conflicting narratives, in which each side claims victimhood and blames the other for past abuses”. This does not bode well for the future.</p>
<p>The divisions in Bosnia are hard to ignore; Srebrenica’s Serb mayor, Mladen Grujičić, <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/srebrenica-s-serb-mayor-repeats-denial-of-genocide-04-13-2017">denies that the genocide occurred</a>, as does <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/thousands-mourn-at-srebrenica-anniversary-commemoration-07-11-2016">Milorad Dodik</a> the leader of Bosnia’s Serb-led entity Republika Srpska. Many Serbian nationalists regard Mladić as a war hero. To many people, his conviction would therefore be <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/22/bosnians-divided-over-ratko-mladic-guilty-verdict-for-war-crimes">effectively meaningless</a>.</p>
<p>And yet, plenty of civil society activities, interventions and educational programmes have been devised. In Bosnia, <a href="https://balkandiskurs.com/en/2018/02/11/youth-united-in-peace-25-years-of-seaside-peacebuilding/">Youth United in Peace</a> and <a href="http://www.yihr.org/">Youth Initiative for Human Rights</a>, to name but two, offer young people the chance to hear different perspectives about the past through workshops and visits to commemorative places of all sides. Such projects try to counter ethnic <a href="https://www.osce.org/mission-to-bosnia-and-herzegovina/education">segregation</a> to offer shared space for dialogue.</p>
<p>In a speech to the United Nations in 1958, <a href="https://www.amnesty.org.uk/universal-declaration-human-rights-UDHR">Eleanor Roosevelt</a> famously said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home – so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighbourhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works.</p>
<p>Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>All too often this is forgotten. But with stark societal divisions palpable in many parts of the world, we have to keep reminding ourselves that all others are above all else human beings. Only if we do that will the idea of human rights be meaningful.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/99122/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The massacre of 8,000 Muslim Bosniaks in a few days in 1995 must never be forgotten.Melanie Klinkner, Principal Academic in International Law, Bournemouth UniversityGiulia Levi, PhD Candidate, Faculty of Health and Social Sciences, Bournemouth UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/880942017-11-24T10:59:46Z2017-11-24T10:59:46ZRatko Mladić convicted – but justice hasn’t entirely been served in the Hague<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196279/original/file-20171124-21801-12li83b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Convicted for genocide and other crimes.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/davidbaileymbe/6892194912/in/photolist-9Mgq4q-oMbmvS-bv3iqL-9MHbyF-GQnVnF-9SqZ6C-GQnVvB-Dpbets-21rZs4G-ZqwwKn-QmyYtM-9Qf31o-GQnV18-GQnVEp-21rZtkE-ZqwwVT-GQnWgz-GQnVNR-GQnVdT-GQnWpF-Dpbex5-ZqNupP-Dpbefm-57FJbJ-7uTBvq-21Nzjq2">David Bailey</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/22/ratko-mladic-convicted-of-genocide-and-war-crimes-at-un-tribunal">conviction</a> of Ratko Mladić in The Hague for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the Bosnian War hardly came as a big surprise. The evidence was strong and stacked up against him. Nearly 600 people gave evidence during his five-year trial including many of his victims. So any robust defence of the charges was always going to be a challenge for Mladić even with the support of a defence team comprised of the most talented lawyers in the world.</p>
<p>Of course, his conviction has been widely hailed in the media as an important
milestone for international criminal justice, since he was one of the first people to be indicted by an international criminal tribunal since <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_trials">Nuremberg</a>. But his conviction also showcases how slow the cogs of international criminal justice seem to turn. Despite being <a href="http://www.icty.org/x/cases/mladic/ind/en/kar-ii950724e.pdf">indicted by the tribunal in 1995</a> he managed to evade the clutches of the court <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/27/world/europe/27ratko-mladic.html">until 2011</a> leading to much speculation about whether the tribunal really possessed much sway in the early days of its existence and whether the international community supported its mission. It was only following political pressure on Belgrade from the European Union that the government renewed its appetite to apprehend him.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196278/original/file-20171124-21858-150m91d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196278/original/file-20171124-21858-150m91d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196278/original/file-20171124-21858-150m91d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196278/original/file-20171124-21858-150m91d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196278/original/file-20171124-21858-150m91d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196278/original/file-20171124-21858-150m91d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196278/original/file-20171124-21858-150m91d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Prosecution team in the case of Ratko Mladić, former commander of the Bosnian Serb Army, at Mladić’s initial appearance.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/icty/38362818296/in/photolist-9Mgq4q-oMbmvS-bv3iqL-9MHbyF-GQnVnF-9SqZ6C-GQnVvB-Dpbets-21rZs4G-ZqwwKn-QmyYtM-9Qf31o-GQnV18-GQnVEp-21rZtkE-ZqwwVT-GQnWgz-GQnVNR-GQnVdT-GQnWpF-Dpbex5-ZqNupP-Dpbefm-57FJbJ-7uTBvq-21Nzjq2">UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Mladić, dubbed the “Butcher of Bosnia”, commanded the Bosnian Serb
forces during <a href="https://theconversation.com/ratko-mladics-conviction-and-why-the-evidence-of-mass-graves-still-matters-87976">the massacre</a> of nearly 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica and the three-year <a href="https://theconversation.com/ratko-mladic-orchestrator-of-the-brutal-siege-of-sarajevo-87969">Siege of Sarajevo</a> which caused nearly <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17617775">10,000</a> civilian deaths.</p>
<p>Aside from one genocide charge he was found guilty of all the other ten counts
including a separate count of taking UN personnel hostage in an effort to thwart NATO airstrikes. Delivering yesterday’s verdict the presiding judge, Alphons Oria, <a href="http://www.unmultimedia.org/radio/english/2017/11/news-in-brief-22-november-2017-geneva-am/#.WhfnjbSFg6g">held</a> that the crimes, “rank among the most heinous known to humankind” and rejected his mitigation pleas of good character, ill-health and diminished mental capacity. </p>
<p>Dogged by health problems Mladić shakily occupied the defendant’s chair on Wednesday morning but following a toilet break he was quickly removed again from court after a tirade of abuse aimed at the judges. His sentence of life imprisonment was handed down in his absence.</p>
<h2>Ethnic tensions</h2>
<p>Only time will tell whether his conviction will bring closure to the families of his victims who are still searching for the remains of loved ones nearly three decades after the war. Ethnic tensions still persist in the former Yugoslavia and many there regard Mladić <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/22/ratko-mladic-bosnia-camps-mass-murder-torture-rape-serbian">as a hero</a> who defended his people and believe that Wednesday’s judgment is a verdict against them as well. </p>
<p>US attorney Christopher Hale, who has worked at the tribunal, has gallantly <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/11/22/565672709/tribunal-finds-ratko-mladic-guilty-of-genocide-crimes-against-humanity-in-bosnia">argued that</a>: “the weight of empirical evidence demonstrates that justice is one of the most vital components to achieving durable peace”. But in reality there is very little evidence to suggest that the trials have brought meaningful reconciliation to the region.</p>
<p>Whatever view we choose to adopt the statistics clearly speak for themselves.
Division between ethnic communities has grown since the end of the war. For
example, Banja Luka was once ethnically diverse - nearly 50% of its population
were Bosnian Serbs while Muslims and Croats represented 19% and 15%
respectively. In 2017, Banja Luka is almost <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/1994/bosnia2/">90% ethnic Serb</a>. Hard questions need to be asked about whether such trials can truly bring about meaningful reconciliation and durable peace to this post-conflict region when the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/1994/bosnia2/">data</a> suggests that ethnic tensions are becoming more deeply entrenched in communities long after the conflict has ended.</p>
<p>The trial of Mladić will be the last at the <a href="http://www.icty.org/">UN International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia</a> (ICTY) before it closes its doors at the end of this year, having arrested and tried more than 161 persons, including Slobodan Milosevic – who controversially <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2006/mar/13/guardianobituaries.warcrimes">died during his trial</a> in 2006 – and the Bosnian Serb leader, Radovan Karadžić who was convicted <a href="https://theconversation.com/five-things-you-need-to-know-about-the-radovan-karadzic-case-56767">for his role</a> in the Srebrenica genocide last year. </p>
<p>So on the face of it the tribunal seems to have achieved rather a lot. But some would argue, myself included, that the tribunal sidestepped the prosecutions of high-ranking commanders of the opposing armed factions in the war for alleged crimes. So ultimately it must be questioned not only whether justice has been achieved but also whether the tribunal has laid down an accurate historical record of the events that occurred.</p>
<p>We are right to question the success of these institutions that market themselves as beacons of international justice – but the process by which individuals are selected by these institutions for investigation and prosecution also needs to be placed under the spotlight.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88094/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anna-Marie Brennan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Last of the big trials for UN International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, but what about high-ranking officials from the other side?Anna-Marie Brennan, Lecturer in Law, University of LiverpoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/879272017-11-23T00:40:44Z2017-11-23T00:40:44ZRatko Mladic, the ‘Butcher of Bosnia’, to spend life in prison for genocide and war crimes<p>The former commander of the Bosnian Serb army, Ratko Mladić, has been found guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, and sentenced to life in prison. </p>
<p>Mladić was convicted by the <a href="http://www.icty.org">International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia</a> of crimes committed against Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats in the former Yugoslavia during the 1990s. <a href="http://www.icty.org/x/cases/mladic/tjug/en/171122-summary-en.pdf">The tribunal declared</a> that the crimes he committed were “among the most heinous known to humankind”.</p>
<p>Trials of former high-ranking war criminals are often peppered with drama, and this week’s verdict announcement was no exception. Disruption of trials is a way for previously powerful people – usually men – to reclaim some of their lost power. </p>
<p>Halfway through the verdict summary announcement, Mladić requested a break. After a lengthy break, the court was informed that Mladić had high blood pressure, but on medical advice, deemed it appropriate to continue. At this point, Mladić refused to sit and began shouting at the judges: “this is a lie” and “shame on you”. </p>
<p>He was thrown out of court, and watched the rest of the proceedings from another room. This unfortunately meant that victims were unable to see his reaction to the long-awaited verdict and sentencing.</p>
<h2>Long road to justice</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.icty.org/en/node/10764">First indicted</a> by the tribunal in 1995, Mladić stayed in military resorts, protected even though a fugitive. He later went into hiding until his arrest in Serbia in 2011. Mladić’s trial began in 2012, concluded in 2016, with the verdict delivered on November 22.</p>
<p>Mladić, who came to be known as the “Butcher of Bosnia”, rose through the ranks to become the commander of the Bosnian Serb army in 1992, participating in atrocities committed under Serbian leader Slobodan Milošević’s regime. Milošević was also tried by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, but died before he could be convicted.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/bosnias-25-year-struggle-with-transitional-justice-75517">Bosnia's 25-year struggle with transitional justice</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Mladić played a leadership role in these atrocities, commanding the army as it committed crimes across the regime. He has been convicted of “Joint Criminal Enterprise” – the international equivalent of conspiracy – alongside other leaders such as Milošević and Bosnian Serb politician Radovan Karadžić. The tribunal found that Mladić was instrumental in the crimes and they would not have taken place without his involvement.</p>
<p>The atrocities included the siege of Sarajevo, which lasted for 44 months from 1992-95. Some 10,000 people died during the siege, including many children. Some of Mladić’s other crimes were committed at internment camps such as Omarska and Foča, where thousands were tortured and raped. He has also been held responsible for the kidnapping of UN peacekeepers in order to leverage NATO to stop air strikes.</p>
<p>Convicting the high-ranking Mladić is symbolic and momentous, as he was the commander of the soldiers who carried out these actions.</p>
<p>Perhaps most significant is the conviction for genocide over mass killings at Srebrenica in July 1995. Some 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were killed and buried in mass graves.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ0iT4mSK0I">Identification of remains</a> is ongoing, with thousands of bones and personal belongings still being analysed in hope of a match for families that continue to seek the whereabouts of loved ones. Identification is hampered by the fact that two months after the killings, bodies were moved to alternative mass grave locations.</p>
<h2>A welcome day for survivors</h2>
<p>The many survivors have waited a long time justice, both for themselves and for their lost loved ones. Some victims <a href="http://www.euronews.com/2017/11/20/families-of-bosnia-victims-head-to-the-hague-for-mladic-verdict">travelled to The Hague</a> to hear the verdict first hand.</p>
<p>It is particularly poignant, given that some of the war criminals convicted by the tribunal have already served their sentences and returned to Serbia and Bosnia, now living in communities with their victims. A life sentence for Mladić is a source of satisfaction to the victims; a minimum justice for their suffering and loss.</p>
<p>Legal consequences of this ruling are also substantial. Proving genocide in court is challenging for prosecutors, with the requirement of a “special intent” to eliminate part or whole of a specific population. </p>
<p>Convictions for genocide are rare; only a handful of convicted perpetrators at the ICTY were found guilty of genocide, including Karadžić and Radislav Krstić, a deputy commander in the Bosnian Serb army. </p>
<p>The confirmation that the Srebrenica massacre was indeed a genocide is important, because many Bosnian Serbs continue to deny the fact. Victims hope the ruling will contribute to a broader acknowledgement, which in turn could help the reconciliation process. </p>
<p>Yet <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/11/bosnia-war-victims-speak-ratko-mladic-verdic-171120142218960.html">others have little hope</a> that the ruling will change things. Srebrenica’s Serb mayor Mladen Grujičić still denies the genocide, and many Serbian nationalists still laud Mladić and his fellow war criminals as heroes.</p>
<p>Mladić was found not guilty of one count of genocide, in reference to a broader spate of killings throughout Bosnia. This is in keeping with previous decisions where Srebrenica has been deemed genocide, but the overall objective of the leadership for the whole of the Yugoslav territory has not.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ratko-mladics-conviction-and-why-the-evidence-of-mass-graves-still-matters-87976">Ratko Mladić's conviction and why the evidence of mass graves still matters</a>
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<p>This verdict is the final judgement to be delivered by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, slated to close at the end of this year. Since it was established in 1993, the tribunal has indicted 161 individuals and convicted 84 perpetrators of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.</p>
<p>Some <a href="http://www.icty.org/en/content/infographic-icty-facts-figures">4,650 witnesses have appeared</a>, more than 1,000 of whom testified about the Srebrenica genocide. There are only seven proceedings remaining, with the UN Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals finalising cases. The tribunal has undoubtedly contributed to justice and reconciliation in the former Yugoslavia.</p>
<p>However, success has not been absolute, with criticism that sentences have been too short. There is also inevitable post-atrocity denial of crimes committed by perpetrators and their communities, with continued rejection by Serbian communities and politicians of the validity and decisions of the Tribunal.</p>
<p>These 84 convictions are clearly only a small proportion of the thousands of perpetrators. With the wind-up of the tribunal, remaining perpetrators will continue to be tried at local war crimes courts in Bosnia.</p>
<p>Throughout Europe, 14 countries have housed convicted tribunal war criminals in their prisons. Mladić will serve his sentence in a country yet to be determined. </p>
<p>While it may not bring their loved ones back, survivors can have some comfort in knowing the man who ordered and oversaw the atrocities will spend the rest of his life in prison.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87927/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Melanie O'Brien is a member of the Australian Red Cross Queensland International Humanitarian Law Committee, and the Second Vice-President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars. </span></em></p>Former commander of the Bosnian Serb army Ratko Mladic has been found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Survivors of the atrocities have today welcomed the long-awaited news.Melanie O'Brien, Research Fellow, TC Beirne Law School, The University of QueenslandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/879692017-11-22T21:41:10Z2017-11-22T21:41:10ZRatko Mladić: orchestrator of the brutal siege of Sarajevo<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195861/original/file-20171122-6031-94dh5o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">General Ratko Mladić – convicted of war crimes and genocide.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/ssoosay/5763104078/in/photolist-9Mgq4q-oMbmvS-bv3iqL-9MHbyF-GQnVnF-GQnVvB-Dpbets-21rZs4G-QmyYtM-ZqwwKn-GQnV18-21rZtkE-GQnVEp-ZqwwVT-GQnWgz-GQnVdT-GQnVNR-GQnWpF-Dpbex5-ZqNupP-Dpbefm-57FJbJ-7uTBvq-9SqZ6C-9Qf31o">Surian Soosay</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ratko Mladić’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/22/ratko-mladic-convicted-of-genocide-and-war-crimes-at-un-tribunal">sentencing for genocide</a> in Srebrenica will doubtless be the headline in the plethora of press coverage that has accompanied judgement of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY). But Mladić was also sentenced for his role in executing <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/it/book/9781137577177">the siege of Sarajevo</a>, the longest siege in modern European history during which citizens were targeted by mortar, shell and sniper fire and the city’s water and electricity was cut off. It was a brutal campaign to break the city’s resistance, and there was no distinction made between military and civilian targets. </p>
<p>Bosnia and Herzegovina was the most multi-ethnic of former Yugoslavia’s six republics. The population of its capital, Sarajevo, mirrored this ethnic complexity and the city itself. But the first multi-party elections in Bosnia in 1990 had brought a tenuous coalition of nationalist parties to power. This coalition, comprising the (Bosniak) Party of Democratic Action (SDA), the Serbian Democratic Party (SDS) and the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) were elected with a Bosniak, Alija Izetbegović, as president. </p>
<p>As the Yugoslav state continued to disintegrate, with Slovenia and Croatia both pursuing independence, Bosnia’s situation became increasingly dangerous. In short, <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/radovan-karadzic-26073">Radovan Karadžić</a>’s SDS wished to remain in a Yugoslav state, whatever form that would take, while both the SDA and the HDZ pursued independence. During heated exchanges in October 1991, the SDS walked out of parliament and set up a parallel Bosnian Serb assembly and <em>de facto</em> headquarters in the nearby Holiday Inn hotel. </p>
<h2>Sliding into war</h2>
<p>On February 29 and March 1, a referendum on independence was held. The SDS, arguing that the decision to hold a referendum was unconstitutional because it was not reached by consensus, called on Serbs to boycott the vote. Those who did vote, largely Bosniaks and Croats, opted for independence. The result initiated the “war of the barricades”, during which the SDS (and later the SDA) erected barricades in areas of Sarajevo they claimed as theirs. War was avoided then, but on April 6, 1992 shots were fired from <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-24730400">the Holiday Inn</a> by snipers into a crowd of peaceful demonstrators who were assembled outside the Bosnian parliament. In the chaos that followed, Karadžić fled. The Bosnian Serb leadership established their wartime base in nearby Pale and heavy weapons were placed on the hills surrounding Sarajevo. Intermittent shelling and sniping began.</p>
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<p>Whether interested in politics or not, the siege imposed itself on ordinary people’s lives in increments. Many continued going to work, despite the sporadic sniper and mortar fire and fierce battles in Ilidža, just west of Sarajevo. They refused to believe it could happen in their city, which was civilised, cultured, part of the European mainstream. But any existing illusions were shattered by the summer of 1992. Mladić assumed command of the Bosnian Serb Army (VRS) in May 1992, promising to “blow the minds” of the citizens of Sarajevo. Throughout the subsequent months the city was heavily shelled, causing significant civilian casualties and the destruction of many important buildings, such as the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bosnia-cityhall/sarajevo-reopens-landmark-city-hall-and-library-destroyed-in-war-idUSKBN0DP0XO20140509">Vijećnica</a>, which housed thousands of rare books and manuscripts. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195858/original/file-20171122-6051-yyzqe8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195858/original/file-20171122-6051-yyzqe8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195858/original/file-20171122-6051-yyzqe8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195858/original/file-20171122-6051-yyzqe8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195858/original/file-20171122-6051-yyzqe8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195858/original/file-20171122-6051-yyzqe8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195858/original/file-20171122-6051-yyzqe8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">General Mladić (centre) arrives for UN-mediated talks at Sarajevo airport, June 1993.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratko_Mladi%C4%87#/media/File:Evstafiev-mladic-sarajevo1993w.jpg">I, Evstafiev</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<p>It was, however, the first winter of the siege that brought real privation to Sarajevo. No running water, no electricity and limited amounts of food (UN aid and anything that could be purchased for inflated prices on the black market) meant the challenges of surviving were manifold. And the extremities of life under siege had a significant impact upon people’s ability to stay sane. Daily shelling and sniping – sometimes in a slow and methodical manner – and constant danger of death placed citizens of Sarajevo in an unimaginable psychological position. Some withdrew into themselves, while others found survival mechanisms and a way of facing the realities of their lives. Otherwise normal activities became vital mechanisms for survival – dressing well, attending theatre performances or going to <em>ad hoc</em> gigs. Humour, albeit of the rather dark variant, was equally important. Preservation of one’s dignity was a serious matter. </p>
<p>The construction of a tunnel (built by the Bosnian Army) underneath Sarajevo airport in 1993 eased the situation somewhat, with arms and food being brought into the city – breaking somewhat the over-inflation of basic goods. But life under siege became a reality with no end in sight. The international community’s efforts to bring the siege to an end had failed, though <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Deliberate_Force">NATO airstrikes on VRS</a> positions, following the two mortar attacks (in February 1994 and August 1995) would eventually help to do so. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195934/original/file-20171122-6013-14qe5iy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195934/original/file-20171122-6013-14qe5iy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195934/original/file-20171122-6013-14qe5iy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195934/original/file-20171122-6013-14qe5iy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195934/original/file-20171122-6013-14qe5iy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195934/original/file-20171122-6013-14qe5iy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195934/original/file-20171122-6013-14qe5iy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">The Sarajevo Tunnel.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/26781577@N07/15840660490/in/photolist-9fD5ai-9fD5cM-9fGevw-8trhr7-q8Mwu3-qqgH75-C8kFuT-HjxHfD-qqgGwh-wDpDRX-oZtdwu-buTb32-buTNtz-buTNNr-buTMbP-buTN26-bsCwiv-9kav2S-9fJnfS">Clay Gilliland</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The war in Bosnia ended with the signing of the <a href="http://www.osce.org/bih/126173">Dayton Peace Agreement</a> in November 1995, though the siege of Sarajevo was not lifted until February 1996. As part of the peace agreement, the vast majority of the city – with the exception of Istočno Sarajevo (eastern Sarajevo) – became part of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, one of the country’s two entities (the other being Republika Srpska). This initiated the departure of the majority of the city’s Serb population. </p>
<p>By the lifting of the siege over 11,000 people, 5,000 of whom were civilians (2,000 were children), were killed during the siege of Sarajevo. In the context of the charges relating to Sarajevo, Mladić’s sentencing is no surprise – his colleagues, <a href="http://www.icty.org/case/galic/4">Stanislav Galić</a> and <a href="http://www.icty.org/case/dragomir_milosevic/4">Dragomir Milošević</a> both commanders of the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps of the VRS had previously received lengthy sentences. Mladić’s sentencing for the siege of Sarajevo (not to mention his other crimes) will never compensate for the destruction of a city and the targeting of civilians, but it may go some way to bringing a close to a dark chapter in Bosnia, and Sarajevo’s, history.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87969/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kenneth Morrison is author of four monographs on the Balkans, including Sarajevo’s Holiday Inn: On the Frontline of Politics and War (Palgrave MacMillan, 2016).</span></em></p>Bosnian Serb general found guilty of genocide.Kenneth Morrison, Professor of Modern South-East European History, De Montfort UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/879762017-11-22T17:21:41Z2017-11-22T17:21:41ZRatko Mladić’s conviction and why the evidence of mass graves still matters<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195903/original/file-20171122-6061-czl9t1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former general Mladić during proceedings in January.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/icty/31737888363/in/photolist-9Mgq4q-oMbmvS-57FJbJ-bv3iqL-GQnVnF-9MHbyF-7uTBvq-9SqZ6C-GQnVvB-QmyYtM-9Qf31o-Dpbets-21rZs4G-ZqwwKn-21rZtkE-GQnV18-Dpbex5-Dpbefm-GQnVEp-GQnWgz-ZqwwVT-GQnVdT-GQnWpF-GQnVNR">UN ICTY</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ratko Mladić <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/22/ratko-mladic-convicted-of-genocide-and-war-crimes-at-un-tribunal">has been convicted</a> of genocide and persecution, extermination, murder and the inhumane act of forcible transfer in the area of Srebrenica in 1995. He was also found guilty of persecution, extermination, murder, deportation and inhumane act of forcible transfer in municipalities throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina and of murder, terror and unlawful attacks on civilians in Sarajevo. </p>
<p>In addition, the former Bosnian Serb army general was convicted for the hostage-taking of UN personnel. But he was acquitted of the charge of genocide in several municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992.</p>
<p>The events that occurred in and around the Srebrenica enclave between July 10-19 1995, where an estimated 8,000 Bosnian Muslims, mostly men and boys, lost their lives, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/05/11/reviews/970511.11grimont.html">are well documented</a>. These atrocities, <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Yugoslavia-Death-Nation-Laura-Silber/dp/0140262636">culminating in</a> the “biggest single mass murder in Europe” since World War II, not only resulted in a tremendous loss of life and emotionally scarred survivors, it also left behind a landscape filled with human remains and mass graves.</p>
<p>Forensic investigations into the Srebrenica massacre <a href="http://eprints.bournemouth.ac.uk/24750/1/Karadzic%E2%80%99s%20guilty%20verdict%20and%20forensic%20evidence%20from%20Bosnia%E2%80%99s%20mass%20graves%20Sci-Justice%202016.pdf">assisted</a> in convicting Mladić, who stood accused for his involvement in implementing and orchestrating the forcible transfer and eventual elimination of the Bosnian Muslim population from Srebrenica. For the Srebrenica investigations, between 1996 and 2001, the <a href="http://www.icty.org/">International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia</a> (ICTY) conducted exhumations at 23 sites, while a further 20 mass graves were probed to confirm that they <a href="http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/documents/P642-1a.pdf">contained human remains</a>. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195909/original/file-20171122-6016-4ntuqv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195909/original/file-20171122-6016-4ntuqv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195909/original/file-20171122-6016-4ntuqv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195909/original/file-20171122-6016-4ntuqv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195909/original/file-20171122-6016-4ntuqv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195909/original/file-20171122-6016-4ntuqv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195909/original/file-20171122-6016-4ntuqv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Srebrenica.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/martijnmunneke/2653413838/in/photolist-53trus-53tuFf-53pecX-53trZG-53tuRh-53tuzf-53tuLW-53pcec-53pcsF-53tvwJ-53pgY6-53tvtd-53pezt-53pdXF-53tsNy-53trCJ-53pftF-53tsru-53tu8y-53tvpG-53trfJ-53phoB-53pe4X-53pffz-53tr4w-53ttaW-53pfn4-53peXP-53tsUY-53tqTq-53pdB4-53pfai-53pgLr-8A4MLN-53pgkx-53tviA-53ph1r-53tvd3-53tuPq-o9UYVS-obNR8L-a5ypHx-53tvaL-53tv93-53pgNn-53pfGX-vSB5KV-a3tvtf-Xefv6v-a3tuw3">Martijn.Munneke/ Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The investigative objectives for these investigations were to:
* Corroborate victim and witness accounts of the massacres;
* Determine an accurate count of victims;
* Determine cause and time of death;
* Determine the sex of victims;
* Determine the identity of victims (a process that is ongoing with the help of DNA analysis); and
* Identify links <a href="http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/documents/P642-1a.pdf">to the perpetrators</a>.</p>
<p>The task of locating and exhuming mass graves in Bosnia continues, as does the general quest of locating the missing in the territory of the former Yugoslavia. And this evidence still matters for the ICTY. Evidence on hundreds of bodies exhumed from the Tomašica mass grave near Prijedor in the north-west of Bosnia and Herzegovina, was <a href="http://www.sense-agency.com/icty/what-post-mortems-of-tomasica-victims-showed.29.html?cat_id=1&news_id=16662">presented in the Mladić trial</a>.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.icty.org/x/cases/mladic/tjug/en/171122-summary-en.pdf">summary judgment</a> read out in the court room in The Hague made this very clear:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>During several weeks in September and early October 1995, senior members of the VRS [Army of the Bosnian-Serb Republic] and the MUP [Ministry of the Interior] attempted to conceal their crimes by exhuming their victims’ remains from several mass graves, and then reburying those remains in more remote areas in Zvornik and Bratunac municipalities. Their attempt to cover up the Srebrenica massacres ultimately failed. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Such attempts at hiding crimes by digging up mass graves only to dispose of the bodies in so called “secondary mass graves” results in commingled and mutilated body parts rendering identification and repatriation of human remains all the more difficult. This causes further and prolonged distress to the survivor population and can be seen as intent to cause suffering.</p>
<p>Properly investigated forensic evidence from mass graves, the presentation of such physical evidence, the testing of expertise, independence and impartiality of the accounts in court, is likely to result in more reliable findings. In the case of Bosnian Serb leader <a href="https://theconversation.com/radovan-karadzic-sentenced-to-40-years-but-peace-is-still-a-work-in-progress-56778">Radovan Karadžić</a> forensic evidence helped confirm the crimes committed – it can be assumed that the same is the case for Mladić; at the time of writing the judgment in its entirety is not available yet. </p>
<p>It is well worth remembering that the information from forensic mass grave investigations has another purpose and does not only speak to a court of law. The work on the ground through organisations such as the <a href="https://www.icmp.int/">International Commission on Missing Persons</a> will continue <a href="https://www.ictj.org/news/karadzic-bosnia-herzegovina-criminal-justice#.VwvL_wtXbgc.twitter">as there are</a> “too many people who are still searching for their children’s bones to bury”. Those forensic findings will have a value and meaning for family members and survivors that judgments such as the Mladić one cannot have. It offers them information on their lost loved ones and, hopefully, the return of their human remains.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87976/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Melanie Klinkner does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Forensic science of the dead helps to convict the living responsible.Melanie Klinkner, Senior Lecturer In Law, Bournemouth UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/859602017-10-25T00:07:17Z2017-10-25T00:07:17ZIt’s not just O'Reilly and Weinstein: Sexual violence is a ‘global pandemic’<p>The recent exposure of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/05/us/harvey-weinstein-harassment-allegations.html">widespread sexual predation in the American media industry</a>, from Harvey Weinstein to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/21/business/media/bill-oreilly-sexual-harassment.html?_r=0">Bill O'Reilly</a>, has elicited shock and sparked debate on violence against women in the United States. </p>
<p>Sexual harassment isn’t the exclusive domain of show biz big shots. It remains alarmingly prevalent nationwide, even as <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/21/5-facts-about-crime-in-the-u-s/">other crimes are generally decreasing</a> nationwide. </p>
<p>In the U.S., a 2006 study found that 27 percent of <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1077801205277358">college women</a> reported some form of forced sexual contact – ranging from kissing to anal intercourse – after enrolling in school. This sexual violence is heavily <a href="https://www.rainn.org/statistics/campus-sexual-violence">underreported</a>, with just 20 percent of female student victims reporting the crime to law enforcement.</p>
<p>Nor is sexual harassment limited to the United States. The U.N. has called gender-based violence <a href="http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=49443#.We-gOa2ZOU0">a “global pandemic</a>.” As experts in emergency medicine and legal research at the <a href="https://hhi.harvard.edu">Harvard Humanitarian Initiative</a>, we believe it’s important to acknowledge that this issue transcends national borders and class boundaries to touch the lives of roughly 33 percent of all women worldwide.</p>
<h2>A world of trouble</h2>
<p>According to <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/43310/1/9241593512_eng.pdf">World Health Organization</a> estimates, one in three women worldwide will experience either physical or sexual violence in her lifetime, many of them before the age of 15. </p>
<p>In fact, for many rural women, their first sexual encounter will be a forced one. Some 17 percent of women in rural Tanzania, 21 percent in Ghana, 24 percent in Peru, 30 percent in Bangladesh and 40 percent in South Africa <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/43310/1/9241593512_eng.pdf">report</a> that their first sexual experience was nonconsensual.</p>
<p>Intimate partner violence is also pervasive globally. In one <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/42495/1/9241545615_eng.pdf">World Health Organization study</a>, 22 to 25 percent of women surveyed in cities in England, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru and Zimbabwe reported that a boyfriend or husband had committed some form of sexual violence against them. Globally, up to 55 percent of women murdered are killed by <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/66/wr/mm6628a1.htm?s_cid=mm6628a1_w">their partners</a>.</p>
<p>Violence against women takes many <a href="http://www.who.int/hac/techguidance/pht/SGBV/en/">forms</a>, ranging from psychological abuse to the kind of sexual predation, sexual assault and rape allegedly committed by Harvey Weinstein. Honor killings, physical attacks, female infanticide, <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-sudan-movies-made-by-researchers-change-the-way-people-see-female-genital-cutting-70824">genital cutting</a>, trafficking, forced marriages and sexual harassment at work and school are also considered gender-based violence.</p>
<p>Rates range from country to country – from 15 percent in Japan to 71 percent in Ethiopia – but violence is, in effect, a ubiquitous female experience.</p>
<p><iframe id="TIlWN" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/TIlWN/4/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Sexual violence is committed at particularly high rates in <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-home-even-when-theres-war-is-the-most-dangerous-place-for-women-81867">crisis settings</a> like war zones, refugee camps and disaster zones.</p>
<p>In these places, even humanitarian workers are not immune. <a href="https://theconversation.com/aid-workers-face-an-underreported-sexual-violence-crisis-74667">Dyan Mazurana</a> and her colleagues at Tufts University <a href="http://fic.tufts.edu/publication-item/stop-the-sexual-assault-against-humanitarian-and-development-aid-workers/">found</a> that many female development-aid staffers in places such as South Sudan, Afghanistan and Haiti had experienced disturbing rates of sexual assault, often perpetrated by their own colleagues. </p>
<p><iframe id="vK4S5" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/vK4S5/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<h2>Explaining sexual violence</h2>
<p>So what’s driving this pervasive phenomenon? Research reveals that there are <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/43310/1/9241593512_eng.pdf">multiple</a> <a href="http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs239/en/">causes</a> of sexual violence, among them gender inequality and power differentials between men and women. </p>
<p>For example, <a href="http://www.nsvrc.org/sites/default/files/Publications_NSVRC_Booklets_Global-perspectives-on-sexual-violence.pdf">sexual violence occurs more frequently</a> in cultures where violence is widely accepted and where beliefs about family honor, sexual purity and male sexual entitlement are strongly held.</p>
<p>Even in many countries that rank well on gender equality, including in <a href="http://hdr.undp.org/en/composite/GII">the United States</a>, weak legal <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/77434/1/WHO_RHR_12.37_eng.pdf">sanctions against perpetrators of sexual violence</a> can encourage and effectively condone such behavior.</p>
<p>So can cultural acceptance. Weinstein’s sexual predatory behavior was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/violence-threats-begging-harvey-weinsteins-30-year-pattern-of-abuse-in-hollywood/2017/10/14/2638b1fc-aeab-11e7-be94-fabb0f1e9ffb_story.html?tid=ss_tw&utm_term=.b69841a6f4f7">longstanding</a> and well-known within the film industry, yet he was allowed to continue his abuse with impunity – until women began speaking up. </p>
<p>Likewise, Fox News <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/21/business/media/bill-oreilly-sexual-harassment.html?_r=0">renewed Bill O'Reilly’s contract</a> even after he and the company had made at least six multi-million-dollar settlements with women who <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/19/business/media/bill-oreilly-fox-news-allegations.html">filed sexual harassment claims against him</a>. Awareness of a problem is one thing; taking action is quite another. </p>
<p>Men with lower educational levels, or who have been exposed to maltreatment or family violence as children, are <a href="http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs239/en/">more likely</a> to commit sexual violence themselves.</p>
<p>That’s because <a href="http://www.hicn.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/HiCN-WP-233.pdf">violence begets violence</a>, a relationship that’s abundantly clear in the kinds of conflict zones where we work. Mass rape has long been used as a weapon of war, and has been <a href="https://www.unicef.org/sowc96pk/sexviol.htm">well-documented</a> during conflicts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Colombia and South Sudan.</p>
<p>Among the most salient cases are the Rwandan and Bosnian genocides. <a href="https://www.un.org/ruleoflaw/files/womenpeaceandsecurity.pdf">According to the U.N.’s High Commissioner for Refugees</a>, up to 500,000 Rwandan women were systematically raped in 1994 as part of an ethnic cleansing strategy, while tens of thousands of Bosnian women and girls were systematically raped between 1992 and 1995.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"921550375739691008"}"></div></p>
<h2>Psychological trauma</h2>
<p>Wherever and however it happens, violence against women and girls poses a major public health problem for women and their communities.</p>
<p>Some 42 percent of women who experience intimate partner violence <a href="http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs239/en/">reported</a> an injury
– including bruises, abrasions, cuts, punctures, broken bones and injuries to the ears and eyes – as a consequence of that abuse. Women who suffer violence are also 1.5 times <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/43310/1/9241593512_eng.pdf">more likely</a> to have sexually transmitted diseases like HIV, syphilis, chlamydia and gonorrhea, twice as likely to experience depression and drinking problems and twice as likely to have an abortion. </p>
<p>Violence against women is also closely <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/42966/1/9241546476_eng.pdf">associated</a> with suicide and self-harm.</p>
<p>If there’s any silver lining to the Weinstein and O'Reilly scandals, it’s that in coming out against these high-profile men, dozens of women have helped to highlight not just the prevalence of sexual violence in the United States but also the societal norms that silence women and allow abusers to go unchecked.</p>
<p>Humanitarian organizations from the <a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/44402/1/9789241500128_eng.pdf">World Health Organization</a> to the <a href="http://www.heforshe.org/en/take-action/violence">U.N.</a> to the <a href="https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1865/Men_VAW_report_Feb2015_Final.pdf">U.S. Agency for International Development</a> have recognized that gender-based violence is not just a women’s issue. Addressing it requires working with men and boys, too, to counter the cultures of toxic masculinity that encourage or tolerate sexual violence. </p>
<p>After all, women’s rights are human rights, so sexual violence is everyone’s problem to solve.</p>
<p>The fact is, societies with high rates of sexual violence are also more likely to be violent and unstable. <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2012/04/24/what-sex-means-for-world-peace/">Research</a> shows that the best predictor of a state’s peacefulness is how well its women are treated.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85960/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Hollywood’s sexual predation scandals are just the tip of the iceberg. One in three women worldwide has been physically or sexually assaulted, and many girls’ first sexual experience is forced.Valerie Dobiesz, Emergency Physician at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Director of External Programs STRATUS Center for Medical Simulation, Core Faculty Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard UniversityJulia Brooks, Researcher in international law and humanitarian response, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (HHI), Harvard UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/809132017-07-14T12:40:08Z2017-07-14T12:40:08ZWhen Bosnia was torn apart, football clubs were ethnically cleansed along with the population<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178114/original/file-20170713-10278-4oz6m8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Displaced team Velež Mostar FC’s far less glamorous postwar home, in the village of Vrapčići.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Richard Mills</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>For tens of thousands of refugees displaced by the war in Bosnia and Hercegovina 25 years ago, the first painful hours after being ejected from their homes were often spent in football stadiums. Some found themselves in stadiums for their own protection, while for others the football stadium was the last they would see of their former community before being expelled in the name of ethnic cleansing. For others still, corralled into stadiums by armed paramilitaries, the football ground would be the last thing they would see.</p>
<p>The three-way conflict that <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17632399">engulfed Bosnia between 1992 and 1995</a> left 100,000 dead and forced half the country’s population to relocate. Used by Serb, Croat and Bosnian government (primarily Bosniak, or Bosnian Muslim) forces, football stadiums and sports infrastructure were part of this – and football clubs themselves suffered alongside the population: some clubs embraced narrow ethnic identities, whereas multi-ethnic clubs became targets. </p>
<p>While many footballers took up arms, hundreds more were displaced by the fighting. Some Serb players fled east to Serbia and continued their careers at clubs in Belgrade and Novi Sad, Velež Mostar FC’s <a href="https://www.transfermarkt.com/nikola-jokisic/profil/spieler/400938">Nikola Jokišić</a> among them. Borac Banja Luka FC continued to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17430437.2013.801220">compete in the Yugoslav football leagues</a> for the duration of the war, playing “home” matches at stadiums across Serbia. Other teams played in the competitions of the incipient Bosnian Serb state. </p>
<p>Talented Croat and Bosniak players headed westward, signing for clubs in neighbouring Croatia or venturing further afield. Like thousands of their compatriots, many footballers rebuilt their lives in countries across western Europe and, while there is a long tradition of Yugoslavia’s best players making profitable moves abroad, the war turned a steady stream into a flood. While the most talented Bosnians found themselves welcome at some of Europe’s best clubs, others scrambled to secure any contract they could in order to escape.</p>
<p>When in 1993 Bosnian Croat forces harnessed <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2010.497018">Velež Mostar’s Bijeli Brijeg Stadium</a> to round up Bosniak civilians from west Mostar, the football club was also a victim. The team had strong links to the failed communist order and espoused a multi-ethnic identity that was ill-suited to the Bosnian Croat project. The team was expelled along with the civilian population.</p>
<p>Ejected from its home, Velež gradually resumed activities in Bosnian government-held territory and competed in Bosnia and Hercegovina’s first wartime championship of 1994. Other clubs, such as Željezničar Sarajevo FC, <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00905992.2016.1219899">split along ethnic lines</a> and rival incarnations laid claim to the club’s history on either side of the front line. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178245/original/file-20170714-14287-y8wjtw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178245/original/file-20170714-14287-y8wjtw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178245/original/file-20170714-14287-y8wjtw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178245/original/file-20170714-14287-y8wjtw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178245/original/file-20170714-14287-y8wjtw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178245/original/file-20170714-14287-y8wjtw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/178245/original/file-20170714-14287-y8wjtw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former home of FC Velež, Mostar’s Bijeli Brijeg stadium now hosts Croatian team HSK Zrinjski.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Stadion_H%C5%A0K_Zrinjski.JPG">Mostarac</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Croat forces and international peacekeepers used Tomislavgrad’s football ground as a reception centre for Croat civilians fleeing fierce fighting in nearby Bugojno. Footage of this operation shows <a href="http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/1060013979">women chatting quietly on rugs laid out under the goal posts</a>, surrounded by hastily-packed bags of prized possessions while their children play on the pitch.</p>
<p>When the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Dayton-Accords">Dayton Accords</a> brought the war to an end a year later, Bosnia was recreated as a federal state, implicitly recognising the results of ethnic cleansing. Territorially, Bosnia’s three principal ethnic groups remain largely separated today, although there is <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2014.974512">a unified football league and national team</a>. Yet Velež has been unable to return to its west Mostar home: <a href="https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/hsk-zrinjski-mostar/startseite/verein/6808">Zrinjski Mostar</a>, a resurrected Croat club that had been banned during the communist era, now plays at the Bijeli Brijeg Stadium. Displaced Velež play their football several miles east of the town at a hastily prepared ground in the village of Vrapčići.</p>
<h2>A changed landscape</h2>
<p>Inside Bosnia today, the football landscape is irrevocably altered. East of Sarajevo, a large new settlement is now home to thousands of Serbs who left the capital as a result of the war. There, inhabitants who once backed Sarajevo’s leading football clubs now gather around Slavija FC, another team resurrected in the early 1990s that boasts a proud Serbian identity. </p>
<p>Elsewhere, Velež and other prominent Bosnian clubs have fans among the displaced supporters who have built new lives beyond the Balkans, who often gather together to celebrate the club that shared their fate. Professional footballers who were child refugees in the 1990s retain strong emotional attachments to Bosnia, even though they have lived the vast majority of their lives in western Europe. </p>
<p>In the UK, <a href="http://www.edp24.co.uk/news/from-refugee-to-footballer-the-journey-of-bosnian-mario-vrancic-to-carrow-road-1-5083043">Norwich City FC’s new Bosnian signing</a> Mario Vrančić, originally from the town of Bosanski Brod, spent most of his life in Germany. Nevertheless he – like other compatriots in similar positions, including his own brother – has proudly represented Bosnia and Hercegovina at international level.</p>
<p>Those who passed through football stadiums after being thrown out of their homes were not the worst affected. Bosnian Serb forces attacking the UN-protected “safe area” of Srebrenica in the summer of 1995 took thousands of Bosniaks who sought refuge there to detention facilities, including the football grounds of lower league Bosnian teams. As described by <a href="http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/329799/srebrenica-by-jan-willem-honig/9780140266320/">witness testimony from UN personnel</a> and in the proceedings of the <a href="http://www.icty.org/">International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia</a>, men and boys were separated, bussed to other facilities, and executed. </p>
<p>A US U-2 spy plane captured images of hundreds packed onto a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/1995/aug/19/warcrimes">football pitch in Nova Kasaba</a>, surrounded by guards. On its return, the spy plane saw only mounds of freshly dug earth in the adjacent field. Some 8,000 men and boys were massacred in the days following Srebrenica’s fall, one of the darkest moments in Bosnian history, but also in the history of Bosnian football.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/80913/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Mills does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In many countries sports like football brings people together, but in Bosnia it re-emphasises the divides.Richard Mills, Lecturer in Modern European History, University of East AngliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/755172017-04-05T01:10:08Z2017-04-05T01:10:08ZBosnia’s 25-year struggle with transitional justice<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/164098/original/image-20170405-14629-16m39ti.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Graves at the memorial center Potocari, near Srebrenica</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Amel Emric</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Bosnian war started 25 years ago this week.</p>
<p>Although bombs ceased falling in 1995, in many ways the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) are as divided as ever. The past two decades have repeatedly shown that divisions exacerbated by the war continue to permeate politics. </p>
<p>In fact, according to a 2013 public opinion poll, just one in six residents of BiH feels that the three ethnic groups that live there – the Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats – have reached <a href="http://www.media.ba/sites/default/files/prism_research_for_un_rco_statistical_report_1.pdf">reconciliation</a>.</p>
<p>It would be easy to pass this sentiment off as what one former U.S. secretary of state called “<a href="http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/ERC/briefing/dispatch/1992/html/Dispatchv3no52.html">ancient tribal, ethnic and religious rivalries</a>.” But I believe it raises profound doubts about the ability of international justice to bring about a more peaceful world.</p>
<p>As I demonstrate in my book, <a href="http://undpress.nd.edu/books/P01398">“The Costs of Justice</a>,” transitional justice – the process of dealing with human rights abuses committed by a previous regime – is an inherently political process made even more contentious by taking it out of the country. The fallout is not just a lack of reconciliation, but also the constant threat of violence. </p>
<p>In BiH, <a href="http://www.media.ba/sites/default/files/prism_research_for_un_rco_statistical_report_1.pdf">more than 30 percent</a> believe a renewal of armed conflict could be right around the corner.</p>
<h2>The G word</h2>
<p>Ongoing resentment in BiH was highlighted by two recent events. </p>
<p>First was the fall election of a Serbian genocide denier, Mladen Grujicic, as mayor of <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2005/07/10/legacy-srebrenica">Srebrenica</a> – a town where more than 8,000 Bosniaks, or Bosnian Muslims, were systematically killed in 1995.</p>
<p>Next came the Bosniak response: a February <a href="http://www.rferl.org/a/icj-bosnia-serbia-genocide/28360242.html">request</a> for the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to review its 2007 ruling that cleared the neighboring state of Serbia of complicity in genocide during the war. </p>
<p>The war may be long over, but wounds are still oozing. </p>
<iframe src="https://www.google.com/maps/embed?pb=!1m18!1m12!1m3!1d2905758.676488683!2d14.726032644738389!3d44.66540078404253!2m3!1f0!2f0!3f0!3m2!1i1024!2i768!4f13.1!3m3!1m2!1s0x134ba215c737a9d7%3A0x6df7e20343b7e90c!2sBosnia+and+Herzegovina!5e0!3m2!1sen!2sus!4v1491325241954" width="100%" height="300" frameborder="0" style="border:0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<p>Lack of reconciliation in BiH comes despite – or perhaps because of – a major international effort to ensure justice in the region. BiH, like other states of the former Yugoslavia, was under the jurisdiction of the <a href="http://www.icty.org/en/about">International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia</a> (ICTY) at The Hague for more than two decades. </p>
<p>The ICTY’s establishment in 1993 was greeted by human rights advocates as the harbinger of a new era of justice. At the time, transitional justice scholars preached its <a href="https://bookstore.usip.org/books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=51329">numerous benefits</a>. These included deterring future rights violations, strengthening rule of law, increasing the legitimacy of a new regime and, perhaps most importantly, encouraging reconciliation within broader society.</p>
<p>There are many <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0022343309340108">ways to address</a> past rights abuses – from issuing apologies and providing victim compensation to holding truth commissions and launching criminal trials. The international community has historically focused on the latter – whether at <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/accountability-for-human-rights-atrocities-in-international-law-9780199546671?cc=us&lang=en&">Nuremberg</a>, <a href="http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/tokyo/tokyolinks.html">Tokyo</a> or <a href="http://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/?GCOI=80140100357920">The Hague</a>.</p>
<p>Criminal prosecutions are largely symbolic, but they are nonetheless important. They signal the end of impunity, or the ability to escape punishment, and the start of a more just order. The fact that post-conflict countries frequently lack institutions strong or independent enough to pursue criminal prosecutions on their own makes international mechanisms indispensable. Indeed, BiH’s inability to carry out its <a href="https://www.ictj.org/sites/default/files/ICTJ-FormerYugoslavia-Domestic-Court-2008-English.pdf">own criminal trials</a> for a decade and a half points to a real need for international courts. </p>
<p>But the very process of taking criminal prosecutions out of the domestic purview can ultimately be a <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/accountability-for-human-rights-atrocities-in-international-law-9780199546671?cc=us&lang=en&">blow to justice</a>. Most locals, for instance, lose interest in trials that play out in faraway courtrooms, meaning trials fail to bring about the sorts of dialogue that might lead to mutual understanding. </p>
<p>Formidable challenges of international prosecutions, from learning the intricacies of a foreign culture and political regime to collecting evidence essential for a successful prosecution, mean that international trials also take a long time to complete. And, of course, they are expensive. The <a href="https://www.wcl.american.edu/hrbrief/15/3skilbeck.pdf">ICTY cost</a> more than US$1 billion, or between $10 million and $15 million for each person accused. Various countries, including the United States, footed the bill.</p>
<p>And yet, rather than improve relations in the region, the ICTY may have <a href="http://undpress.nd.edu/books/P01398">incited tensions</a>. Each of the parties claimed they were unfairly targeted. Serbs were infuriated by their overrepresentation on the court’s docket. Croats couldn’t believe that any of their heroes were facing judgment. </p>
<p>Little surprise then that <a href="http://www.media.ba/sites/default/files/prism_research_for_un_rco_statistical_report_1.pdf">only 8 percent</a> of those polled in BiH in 2013 felt the ICTY had done a good job facilitating reconciliation. </p>
<p>While international courts did little for reconciliation, they fundamentally sabotaged more <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-2486.2009.00891.x/abstract">organic forms of justice</a> than could otherwise have happened at the local level. In the former Yugoslavia, political leaders who were struggling to balance international pressure for – and domestic opposition to – ICTY cooperation opted for half-baked local initiatives designed to satisfy both. The result was a watered-down <a href="https://www.usip.org/publications/2002/02/truth-commission-serbia-and-montenegro">truth commission</a> here, an <a href="http://www.rferl.org/a/1105227.html">apology</a> of questionable sincerity there. </p>
<p>These half-measures ultimately replaced what might have been <a href="https://academic.oup.com/ijtj/article-abstract/10/2/292/2356904/History-of-a-Failure-Attempts-to-Create-a-National?redirectedFrom=fulltext">more earnest mechanisms</a> had they not been established in the context of ongoing international trials. The recent Bosniak appeal to the ICJ, just like the key political victory of a Serb genocide denier, highlights the degree to which justice and historical memory remain politicized in BiH a quarter-century after the war began. </p>
<h2>The ICTY’s long shadow</h2>
<p>The ICTY and subsequent tribunals demonstrated that international prosecutions can play an important role in ending impunity. But they must carefully balance the need of the international community to ensure accountability with the needs of a local populace to deal with past rights abuses on their own terms. </p>
<p>Limiting international prosecutions to the most serious perpetrators is one way to reach this balance. Few in Serbia shed tears for the arrest of Slobodan Milosevic, a corrupt dictator. </p>
<p>Even then, the recent experience of the International Criminal Court (ICC), established in 2002 as a permanent and global version of the ICTY, demonstrates this can be a tough sell. Numerous African states have accused the ICC of the same bias Yugoslavs attributed to the ICTY. They are <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/law/2017/jan/31/african-leaders-plan-mass-withdrawal-from-international-criminal-court">threatening to withdraw</a> as a result.</p>
<p>Back in Bosnia, the <a href="http://www.rferl.org/a/icj-bosnia-serbia-genocide/28360242.html">ICJ last month rejected</a> the Bosniak request on the grounds it did not come from all three members of the country’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/oct/08/bosnia-herzegovina-elections-the-worlds-most-complicated-system-of-government">tripartite presidency</a>. In other words, the very lack of reconciliation between Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats that prompted the initial appeal now makes that appeal impossible. It is ironic that Bosniaks still feel the need to turn to international justice mechanisms for redress. After all, international justice may bear some blame for the predicament they’re in today.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/75517/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian Grodsky received funding from a number of organizations while carrying out research in the former Yugoslavia, including grants from Fulbright-Hayes and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. </span></em></p>How long does it take to make peace? Decades after the end of the Bosnian war, just one in six residents felt that country had reached reconciliation.Brian Grodsky, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Maryland, Baltimore CountyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.