Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I support the marking of the anniversary of the genocide that took place in Srebrenica 22 years ago. It was one of the gravest atrocities of our times. As Deputies have noted, more than 8,000 people - mainly men and boys - were systematically massacred while thousands of others - mainly women, children and older people - were forced to flee the country. The horror stories of genocide, rape and terror still seem unimaginable today. The revulsion they engender has not dissipated with the passage of time. The genocide in Srebrenica was part of the loss of 100,000 lives in the Bosnian War. Some 7,000 people are still missing.

When we start talking about casualty numbers, we can often lose a real sense that each one of the people we are talking about was an individual person - part of an individual family with an individual story. For that reason, I would like to read from a very good article that was published in The Irish Timeson the 20th anniversary of the Srebrenica atrocity. I cannot seem to find the name of the journalist who wrote it. I apologise for my pronunciation as I read from the piece in question. It tells the story of a woman, Hajra Catic, and her only son, Nino. She "watched in disbelief as the Bosnian Serbs took equipment and even uniforms from the Dutch, who proceeded to force the Bosniaks to leave the Potočari camp in the custody of Mladic's men".

The article continues:

"I thought the Serbs would put us in prison camps or make us work in mines. Then they began separating the men and boys from the women and smallest children, and saying they would be taken away for interrogation," Catic says. "But it was suspicious, because they took away boys as young as 10 and men who were 80 years old. Later we looked for them in the prisons and the mines. But there was no sign of them."

In the days that followed, in the fields and creeks of the verdant Srebrenica valley, in warehouses and barns and on the side of country lanes, more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were murdered.

As the Dutch battalion quietly withdrew – taking with it the world’s hollow promise to prevent a massacre – Mladic’s soldiers used guns, knives and grenades to conduct the worst massacre in Europe since the second World War.

I remember it playing out on the television and following it in the papers at the time. One can put oneself in the place of someone searching for someone's husband, son, brother or other relative. I have stood at various memorials with family members who suffered loss as a result of genocide and memorial days such as this are hugely important to remind us what happens when international eyes close to horrors beyond our own shores. The scale of the genocide and the swiftness of the horror should continue to act as a reminder to the international community that collective responsibility is vitally important. Post Second World War, there was a collective gnashing of teeth regarding what had been allowed to transpire in Nazi Germany, but what lessons have been learned? The same dearth of responsibility existed when Srebrenica occurred and when the Rwandan atrocities were perpetrated, and it continues to exist while Darfur rages and people flee Eritrea, while the images from Serbia continue to haunt our television screens on most nights. What happened in Srebrenica should never be repeated but saying it is not enough. The international community should take steps to ensure it cannot and does not happen again.

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