25 years after Srebrenica massacre, int’l crimes are still difficult to prosecute

David Scheffer: Well, it’s extremely important. The Srebrenica massacre was the final large atrocity of the Bosnian conflict of the early 1990s. It was not really supposed to happen. There were considerable efforts to reach a negotiated settlement between the Bosnian Serbs and the Bosnian Muslims. And so having suddenly a huge genocidal event …On the one hand, it was horrific. And on the other hand, it was such a shock to the system, and it galvanized the West to finally use military power to bring the conflict to an end. It has sort of an ironic consequence at the end of the day that the atrocity itself actually brought the war to an end.

In Srebrenica, it was the Bosnian Serbs. And of course, there was complicity on the part of the Serbian government, which was supporting the Bosnian Serbs. And that has been proven in the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, with the convictions of General Radislav Krstić, General Ratko Mladić and President Radovan Karadzić at the time. 

Yes. As ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues in the late 1990s, I was responsible for helping bring as much evidence as possible to the Yugoslav tribunal in The Hague that would implicate senior leaders.

Yes. These are mid-level and low-level individuals. Now, many of them have been brought to justice before the war crimes chamber, which sits in Sarajevo. That’s a domestic Bosnian court. But others are living in Serbia, and some of them have been brought to justice, but many have not. So there’s a large number of actual physical perpetrators of the genocidal acts at Srebrenica who continue to evade arrest or evade justice, depending on where they’re living and what the authorities consider to be appropriate for bringing them to trial.

Not enough is being done. But I think there are very brave and committed individuals and even governments around the world that are doing the best they can. For example, with Syria that the US and France and the UK on the Security Council have sought to have the whole Syrian situation referred to the International Criminal Court for investigation and prosecutions. But that referral has been vetoed by Russia, which of course is aligned with the Assad government in Syria. Frankly, why there has not been a referral of the Yemen situation to the International Criminal Court pretty much boggles my mind, although I can understand the politics of it.

Well, because Yemen is not a state party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, you have to get a referral by the UN Security Council to the court. In the case of Yemen, of course, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are prominent parties in the conflict in Yemen. And I can imagine that politically, the Trump Administration would not necessarily be the one to refer Yemen or bring it up in the Security Council, given its relationships with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. But at the end of the day, you would have to get all five votes of the permanent members of the Security Council. But that’s extremely difficult with Yemen because of the politics concerned.  

I am not conversant with that since I’m not in the government anymore. I do know that Ambassador Tan has a long background in understanding the crimes against humanity that have been committed and continue to be committed in North Korea. And so I would anticipate that his office, under his leadership, continues to look at that issue, that it was something the US could take the lead on and even if one fails in the Security Council, at least go on record of trying.