Skip to content
BiH Atlas
Era 15 of 16

The Bosnian Genocide

The July 1995 killings at Srebrenica, ruled genocide by both the ICTY and the International Court of Justice; 8,372 names at the Potočari memorial; and the decades of forensic identification that followed.

How this page is worded
This page describes crimes and casualties. Numbers are given with their source (memorial registers, court findings, the Research and Documentation Center) and the wording follows what the ICTY and ICJ found. Where sources differ, both figures appear.

The ultimate peak of systematic violence occurred in July 1995 in Srebrenica, an eastern Bosnian town that had been declared a demilitarized 'safe area' under United Nations protection in 1993. On July 11, 1995, the Army of Republika Srpska (VRS), under the direct command of General Ratko Mladić and political leadership of Radovan Karadžić, overran the enclave while the lightly armed Dutch UN battalion, denied NATO close air support, did not stop the takeover (the Dutch Supreme Court in 2019 held the Netherlands partly liable for about 350 men expelled from its compound). In the subsequent days, VRS forces separated and killed Bosniak men and boys (8,372 names are inscribed at the Potočari memorial; the ICTY found 7,000 to 8,000 killed) in various locations around Srebrenica, including Potočari, Kravica, and Branjevo, burying the victims in mass graves and later using heavy machinery to scatter the remains in secondary and tertiary graves to conceal the crime.

Both the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that the Srebrenica massacre constituted genocide under international law. In its 2007 judgment the ICJ found that Serbia had not committed genocide but had violated its obligation to prevent it and to punish the perpetrators. Through decades of relentless forensic investigation, utilizing DNA matching led by the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP), thousands of victims have been identified and reburied at the Srebrenica-Potočari Memorial Center, serving as a solemn, undeniable forensic record to the atrocities.

Dated events

  1. July 11–16, 1995

    The Srebrenica Massacre

    Killing of Bosniak men and boys after the fall of the enclave: 8,372 names are inscribed at the Potočari memorial; the ICTY (Krstić) found that 7,000 to 8,000 were killed. Europe's worst mass killing since the Second World War.

    Actors: General Ratko Mladić, VRS units, Dutchbat peacekeepers

  2. 2 Aug 2001 and 19 Apr 2004

    ICTY Krstić judgments

    On 2 August 2001 the Trial Chamber convicts General Radislav Krstić of genocide, the tribunal's first genocide conviction. On 19 April 2004 the Appeals Chamber reduces the conviction to aiding and abetting genocide while confirming that genocide was committed at Srebrenica.

    Actors: General Radislav Krstić, ICTY Judges

  3. February 26, 2007

    ICJ Genocide Judgment

    The ICJ legally defines the Srebrenica massacre as genocide, ruling on the international responsibility of states.

    Actors: International Court of Justice, Bosnia vs. Serbia

Sources and verification

Fact-checked 2026-09-11. Errors found in the draft were corrected and logged.