naser oric, srebrenica genocide, and serbian lies

8/9/2019 Naser Oric, Srebrenica Genocide, and Serbian Lies

1/3

Oric's Two Years

July 11, 2006

Skepticism in Serbia about the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

(ICTY) is nothing new, but the recent judgment against Naser Oric has provoked a storm of

criticism. The court sentenced Oric, the wartime commander of the Bosnian Muslim forces in

Srebrenica, to two years imprisonment for command responsibility in the murder of five Serb

prisoners and cruel treatment of ten others, committed by individuals under his control in 1992

and 1993.

It is possible, of course, that the ICTY judges wrongly interpreted some evidence and let Oric

off too lightly. The Appeals Chamber will probably address that issue [note: the AppealsChamber acquitted Naser Oric on all counts], in addition to examining the trial chambers

implicit position that the superior who does not prevent crimes should be punished less

severely than the direct perpetrators over which he had effective control.

But the critiques by the local press and politicians in Serbia dont focus on arguments about the

legal approach of the ICTY judges. Instead, they argue that Orics sentence confirms the courts

bias against Serbs. This criticism is based on an inaccurate history of the Bosnian war and

distortions of the courts record.

Many in Serbia continue to believe that Muslim crimes in the villages around Srebrenica in

1992 and 1993 [note: and a multitude of Serb war crimes around Srebrenica in this period] are

equivalent to the mass killings of the Muslims in Srebrenica in July 1995, and that Oric was the

mastermind of all these crimes. These beliefs became entrenched last year, around the time of

the tenth anniversary of the genocide in July 1995. The ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical

Party launched an aggressive campaign to prove that Muslims had committed crimes

against thousands of Serbs in the area. The campaign was intended to diminish the


2/3

significance of the July 1995 crime, and many in Serbia were willing to accept that

version of history.

But as the Oric judgment makes clear, the facts do not support the equivalence thesis.

Take the events in the village of Kravica, on the Serb Orthodox Christmas on January 7,

1993, for example. The alleged killing of scores of Serbs and destruction of their houses in

the village is frequently cited in Serbia as the key example of the heinous crimescommitted by the Muslim forces around Srebrenica.

In fact, the Oric judgment confirms that there were Bosnian Serb military forces present

in the village at the time of attack. In 1998, the wartime New York Times correspondent

Chuck Sudetic wrote in his book on Srebrenica that, of forty-five Serbs who died in the

Kravica attack, thirty-five were soldiers. Original Bosnian Serb army documents,

according to the ICTY prosecutor and the Sarajevo-based Center for Research and

Documentation of War Crimes, also indicate that thirty-five soldiers died.

The critics also invoke unreliable statistics. A spokesman for the ruling Democratic Partyof Serbia in the wake of the Oric judgment, for example, claimed that we have

documents showing that 3,260 people were found dead around Srebrenica from 1992-

1995. However, the book Hronike nasih grobalja (Chronicles of Our Graveyards) by the

Serb historian Milivoje Ivanisevic (the president of the Belgrade Centre for Investigating

Crimes Committed against the Serbian People), uses the significantly lower figure, of

more than 1,000 persons [who] died, and contains the list, mostly made of men of

military age. Among those killed, there were evidently a significant number of Bosnian

Serb soldiers who died in the fighting, like in Kravica.

To be sure, the Oric judgment establishes a number of instances in which killings of civiliansand prisoners, cruel treatment, and destruction of property did take place. But the major points

of the judgment are much more complex than the prevailing Serb narrative on Srebrenica. Likethe report by the Dutch Institute for War Documentation on Srebrenica (2002) and Sudetics

book, the judgment finds that the regular Bosnian troops in Srebrenica were often unable to

restrain the large groups of starving civilians who took part in the attacks on the Serb villages.

The absence of Orics effective control over the civilians was the basis for his acquittal on the

charges of destruction of property.

Presumptions of bias appear to stand in the way of a balanced assessment of the Oric judgment.

According to the editor-in-chief of Politika, the ICTYs acceptance of food shortages and

general chaos in Srebrenica as a mitigating circumstance for Naser Oric, implicitly cast the

Bosnian Serbs as the aggressors. In reality, the chambers reasoning that that hunger and

overcrowding had crippled Orics ability to assert his command was unrelated to the ethnicity

of the besieged and the forces surrounding them.

Politikas editor also claimed that the Oric judgment marks the first time that the ICTY has

considered the youth, inexperience, and bloodthirsty mood of the accused as mitigating

circumstances. In reality, the young age of the accused was a mitigating circumstance in the


3/3

cases against Drazen Erdemovic, Anto Furundzija, Goran Jelisic, and Tihomir Blaskic. The

chamber makes no mention of Orics bloodthirstiness, or anything similar, and clearly does

not consider it a mitigating circumstance.

There is nothing wrong with debating the work of the ICTY. But rather than asking reasonable

questions about the judges approach to the law, the critics prefer the comforting myth that the

ICTY is biased against Serbs.

naser oric, srebrenica genocide, and serbian lies

Documents