Bosnian Serbs refuse collective responsibility

Bosnian Serbs refuse collective responsibility

The document is an attempt to defuse political tensions in the country caused by the ruling of the International Court of Justice in The Hague, which last month cleared Serbia of genocide, but placed the responsibility with Bosnian Serbs' wartime officials.

"We are seriously worried because of radicalization of political and ethnic relations in Bosnia-Herzegovina following the ICJ's verdict. Politicization and misinterpretation of the verdict go over the line of maximal tolerance, jeopardizing peace and stability and ethnic relations in the country," said the declaration.

The reaction of Bosnian Serb leaders was provoked by a recent statement of the Muslim member of Bosnia's Presidency Haris Silajdžic who said that the ICJ's decision proved that Bosnia's current constitution, which divides the country into two ethnic entities, must be changed.

Referring to Srpska Republic, often considered by Bosnian Muslim officials as the product of genocide, Silajdžic suggested "gradual reform of the constitution, which would completely annul the results of the genocide."

Reiterating that the ICJ ruled out that the massacre in Srebrenica, in which Bosnian Serb troops killed up to 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men after capturing the area on 11 July 1995, was genocide, Silajdžic also requested a special status for the former eastern Bosnian Muslim enclave.

The solutions for Srebrenica, according to Bosnian Muslim returnees there, should come quickly, or they would all leave the town again.

"The political circle in Sarajevo only wants to use the ICJ's verdict to diminish political and other rights of Serbs in Bosnia- Herzegovina," said the Bosnian Serb officials' declaration.

In the document, Bosnian Serb authorities apologized again to the families of the victims of war in Bosnia and expressed their deepest regret stressing that only individuals could be blamed for the atrocities, not an entire people.

"Authorities of the Srpska Republic will make their best efforts in locating and apprehending the persons responsible for the crimes committed during the 1992-1995 war. That is our obligation," the declaration said.