[Congressional Bills 114th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 310 Introduced in House (IH)]

114th CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. RES. 310

    Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives regarding 
                              Srebrenica.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             June 12, 2015

  Mr. Smith of New Jersey (for himself, Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson of 
  Texas, Mr. Sensenbrenner, Mr. Engel, Mr. Turner, Mr. Connolly, Mr. 
Weber of Texas, Mr. Larson of Connecticut, Mr. Emmer of Minnesota, Mr. 
  Sean Patrick Maloney of New York, Mr. Crenshaw, Mr. McDermott, Mr. 
 Rothfus, Mr. Rush, Mr. Zinke, Ms. Lofgren, Mr. Kinzinger of Illinois, 
  Mr. McGovern, Mr. Fortenberry, Mr. Clay, Mr. King of New York, Mr. 
  Cicilline, Mr. Hultgren, Mr. Quigley, Mr. Marino, Mr. Keating, Mr. 
  Perry, Ms. Meng, and Mr. Cook) submitted the following resolution; 
         which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION


 
    Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives regarding 
                              Srebrenica.

Whereas July 2015 will mark 20 years since the genocide at Srebrenica in Bosnia 
        and Herzegovina;
Whereas beginning in April 1992, aggression and ethnic cleansing perpetrated by 
        Bosnian Serb forces resulted in a massive influx of Bosniaks seeking 
        protection in Srebrenica and its environs, which the United Nations 
        Security Council designated a ``safe area'' within the Srebrenica 
        enclave in Resolution 819 on April 16, 1993, under the protection of the 
        United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR);
Whereas the UNPROFOR presence in Srebrenica consisted of a Dutch peacekeeping 
        battalion, with representatives of the United Nations High Commissioner 
        for Refugees, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and the 
        humanitarian medical aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors 
        Without Borders) helping to provide humanitarian relief to the displaced 
        population living in conditions of massive overcrowding, destitution, 
        and disease;
Whereas early in 1995, an intensified blockade of the enclave by Bosnian Serb 
        forces deprived the entire population of humanitarian aid and outside 
        communication and contact, and effectively reduced the ability of the 
        Dutch peacekeeping battalion to deter aggression or otherwise respond 
        effectively to a deteriorating situation;
Whereas beginning on July 6, 1995, Bosnian Serb forces attacked UNPROFOR 
        outposts, seized control of the isolated enclave, held captured Dutch 
        soldiers hostage and, after skirmishes with local defenders, took 
        control of the town of Srebrenica on July 11, 1995;
Whereas an estimated one-third of the population of Srebrenica at the time, 
        including a relatively small number of soldiers, attempted to pass 
        through the lines of Bosnian Serb forces to the relative safety of 
        Bosnian-government controlled territory, but many were killed by patrols 
        and ambushes;
Whereas the remaining population sought protection with the Dutch peacekeeping 
        battalion at its headquarters in the village of Potocari north of 
        Srebrenica, but many of these individuals were with seeming randomness 
        seized by Bosnian Serb forces to be beaten, raped, or executed;
Whereas Bosnian Serb forces deported women, children, and the elderly in buses, 
        but held over 8,000 primarily Bosniak men and boys at collection points 
        and sites in northeastern Bosnia and Herzegovina under their control, 
        and then summarily executed these captives and buried them in mass 
        graves;
Whereas Bosnian Serb forces, hoping to conceal evidence of the massacre at 
        Srebrenica, subsequently moved corpses from initial mass grave sites to 
        many secondary sites scattered throughout parts of eastern Bosnia and 
        Herzegovina under their control;
Whereas the International Commission for Missing Persons (ICMP) deserves 
        recognition for its assistance to the relevant institutions in Bosnia 
        and Herzegovina in accounting for close to 90 percent of those 
        individuals reported missing from Srebrenica, despite active attempts to 
        conceal evidence of the massacre, through the careful excavation of mass 
        graves sites and subsequent DNA analysis which confirmed the true extent 
        of the massacre;
Whereas the massacre at Srebrenica was among the worst of many atrocities to 
        occur in the conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina from April 1992 to 
        November 1995, during which the policies of aggression and ethnic 
        cleansing pursued by Bosnian Serb forces with the direct support of the 
        Serbian regime of Slobodan Milosevic and its followers ultimately led to 
        the displacement of more than 2,000,000 people, more than 100,000 
        killed, tens of thousands raped or otherwise tortured and abused, 
        including at concentration camps in the Prijedor area, with the innocent 
        civilians of Sarajevo and other urban centers repeatedly subjected to 
        traumatic shelling and sniper attacks;
Whereas in addition to being the primary victims at Srebrenica, individuals with 
        Bosniak heritage comprise the vast majority of the victims during the 
        conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina as a whole, especially among the 
        civilian population;
Whereas Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the 
        Crime of Genocide defines genocide as ``any of the following acts 
        committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, 
        ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) killing members of the 
        group; (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the 
        group; (c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life 
        calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; 
        (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; and 
        (e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group'';
Whereas, on May 25, 1993, the United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 
        827 establishing the International Criminal Tribunal for the former 
        Yugoslavia (ICTY), based in The Hague, the Netherlands, and charging the 
        ICTY with responsibility for investigating and prosecuting individuals 
        suspected of committing war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity 
        and grave breaches of the 1949 Geneva Conventions on the territory of 
        the former Yugoslavia since 1991;
Whereas the ICTY, along with courts in Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as in 
        Serbia, have indicted and in most cases convicted approximately three 
        dozen individuals at various levels of responsibility for grave breaches 
        of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, violations of the laws or customs of 
        war, crimes against humanity, genocide, and complicity in genocide 
        associated with the massacre at Srebrenica, most notably Radovan 
        Karadzic and Ratko Mladic whose trials are ongoing;
Whereas both the ICTY and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) have ruled 
        that the actions of Bosnian Serb forces in Srebrenica in July 1995 
        constitute genocide;
Whereas House Resolution 199, passed on June 27, 2005, expressed the sense of 
        the House of Representatives that the aggression and ethnic cleansing 
        committed by Serb forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina meets the terms 
        defining genocide according to the 1949 Genocide Convention;
Whereas the United Nations has largely acknowledged its failure to fulfill its 
        responsibility to take actions and make decisions that could have 
        deterred the assault on Srebrenica and prevented the subsequent genocide 
        from occurring;
Whereas some prominent Serbian and Bosnian Serb officials, among others, have 
        denied or at least refused to acknowledge that the massacre at 
        Srebrenica constituted a genocide, or have sought otherwise to 
        trivialize the extent and importance of the massacre; and
Whereas the international community, including the United States, has continued 
        to provide personnel and resources, including through direct military 
        intervention, to prevent further aggression and ethnic cleansing, to 
        negotiate the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and 
        Herzegovina (initialed in Dayton, Ohio, on November 21, 1995, and signed 
        in Paris on December 14, 1995), and to help ensure its fullest 
        implementation, including cooperation with the International Criminal 
        Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia as well as reconciliation among all 
        of Bosnia and Herzegovina's citizens: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
            (1) affirms that the policies of aggression and ethnic 
        cleansing as implemented by Serb forces in Bosnia and 
        Herzegovina from 1992 to 1995 meet the terms defining the crime 
        of genocide in Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention 
        and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide;
            (2) condemns statements that deny or question that the 
        massacre at Srebrenica constituted a genocide;
            (3) urges the Atrocities Prevention Board, a United States 
        interagency committee established by the Administration in 
        2012, to study the lessons of Srebrenica and issue informed 
        guidance on how to prevent similar incidents from recurring in 
        the future, paying particular regard to troubled countries 
        including but not limited to Syria, the Central African 
        Republic and Burundi;
            (4) encourages the United States to maintain and reaffirm 
        its policy of supporting the independence and territorial 
        integrity of Bosnia and Herzegovina, peace and stability in 
        southeastern Europe as a whole, and the right of all people 
        living in the region, regardless of national, racial, ethnic or 
        religious background, to return to their homes and enjoy the 
        benefits of democratic institutions, the rule of law, and 
        economic opportunity, as well as to know the fate of missing 
        relatives and friends;
            (5) recognizes the achievement of the International 
        Commission for Missing Persons (ICMP) in accounting for those 
        missing in conflicts or natural disasters around the world and 
        believes that the ICMP deserves justified recognition for its 
        assistance to Bosnia and Herzegovina and its relevant 
        institutions in accounting for approximately ninety percent of 
        those reported missing after the Srebrenica massacre and 
        seventy percent of those reported missing during the whole of 
        the conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina;
            (6) welcomes the arrest and transfer to the International 
        Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) of all 
        persons indicted for war crimes, crimes against humanity, 
        genocide and grave breaches of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, 
        particularly those of Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, which 
        has helped strengthen peace and encouraged reconciliation 
        between the countries of the region and their citizens;
            (7) asserts that it is in the national interest of the 
        United States that those individuals who are responsible for 
        these crimes and breaches should continue to be held 
        accountable for their actions, and that the work of the ICTY 
        therefore warrants continued support until all trials and 
        appeals have been completed; and
            (8) honors the thousands of innocent people killed or 
        executed at Srebrenica in Bosnia and Herzegovina in July 1995, 
        along with all individuals who were victimized during the 
        conflict and genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina from 1992 to 
        1995, as well as foreign nationals, including United States 
        citizens, and those individuals in Serbia, Bosnia and 
        Herzegovina, and other countries of the region who risked and 
        in some cases lost their lives during their brave defense of 
        human rights and fundamental freedoms, and advocacy of respect 
        for ethnic identity without discrimination.
                                 <all>