Srebrenica memorial to point finger at UN

The “Pillar of Shame” is to be raised in the hills above Srebrenica with a controversial goal: singling out the UN and international leaders as the ones most responsible for failing to prevent the mass killings. Ahead of the 15th anniversary of the massacre  on Sunday, Ruch said he is looking forward to the debate the monument is almost certain to generate when it goes up at some point next year.

The German activist describes his project as a “warning for all future UN employees never again just to stand by when genocide unfolds” — alluding to the failure of UN peacekeepers to protect the Srebrenica victims during the Bosnian war. On July 11, 1995, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and youths were slaughtered by Bosnian Serb troops in an enclave supposedly protected by UN peacekeepers.
The UN had declared Serb-besieged Srebrenica a protected area for civilians. But the few hundred Dutch Blue Helmets on the ground were left short of credible weaponry or a clear mandate to protect the town.

Srebrenica fell to the Serbs after senior UN commanders dithered on Dutch requests for air strikes and its overwhelmingly Bosnian Muslim residents swarmed the UN military base, seeking refuge. But the peacekeepers allowed the Serbs to take away the townspeople when Gen Ratko Mladic, their leader, said they would not be harmed.