Canada mourns for Srebrenica victims, provinces declare July 11 Remembrance Day

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The state of Canada at the federal level, several Canadian provinces and territories and nine Canadian cities held a commemoration on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide, Canada's Institute for the Research of Genocide said Saturday.

Mayors of Canadian cities of Toronto, Hamilton, London, Niagara Falls, Windsor, St. Jones, Halifax, Fredericton and Saskatoon all proclaimed July 11 as Srebrenica Remembrance Day.

The panel before the Hamilton City Assembly building showed a message saying: “Paying tribute to the victims of the Srebrenica genocide. ‘Never Again’,” by the order of Mayor Fred Eisenberger.

He also ordered that Bosnian flag be flown on a mast in front of the Assembly building. As the same time, the City of Hamilton’s symbol was lit with white and green light, symbolizing the Srebrenica Remembrance flower.

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The Genocide Research Institute also said that the Canadian Human Rights Museum in Winnipeg will also hold a special commemoration for the Srebrenica victims as well as several hundred mosques across Canada, standing in solidarity with the victims as well as survivors of the massacre that took place on July 11, 1995, when eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica was overrun by Bosnian Serb forces.

During the 1992-1995 Bosnian war for independence from the former Yugoslavia, the country lost over 100,000 people, over 8,000 of which were lost in July 1995 in Srebrenica, when Bosnian Serb forces, which received financial and logistical support both from Serbian authorities and individuals during the war, overrun the then UN-protected zone of Srebrenica.
The International Criminal Tribunal (ICTY) for the Former Yugoslavia and the International Court of Justice later ruled that the massacre was an act of genocide.

International and regional courts have sentenced 45 people for what happened in Srebrenica to a total of more than 700 years behind bars.

Those who the ICTY sentenced to life imprisonment are Ljubisa Beara, Zdravko Tolimir, and Vujadin Popovic. But the most well-known alleged masterminds of what happened in Srebrenica are former Bosnian Serb politician Radovan Karadzic and ex Bosnian Serb general Ratko Mladic, and both have been sentenced for it but have appealed.