In her interview with BIRN, Nderitu noted that Srebrenica is a very important place for the whole world to which she wants to return throughout her mandate and warn about the potential consequences of hate speech and denial of war crimes.

“The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia rendered a decision, a final decision, that genocide happened here,” she said.

“It is often called the crime of all crimes and it is extremely important to gather on its anniversary at the place where it happened,” she added in the interview, which took place one day before the marking of the anniversary of genocide in which more than 7,000 people, predominantly men and boys, were killed. More than 40,000 women, children and elderly were deported.

Nderitu said that during her previous visit to Bosnia, she was worried because she heard in the news and on social media that genocide was still routinely denied and criminals glorified in Bosnia.

After last year’s commemoration, former High Representative to Bosnia and Herzegovina Valentin Inzko moved to stop this, imposing an amendment to the criminal code to outlaw the denial of genocide and other war crimes and glorification of convicted war criminals.

Alice Wairimu Nderitu at the conference commemorating the anniversary of the genocide in Srebrenica in 2022. Photo: Srebrenica Memorial Center.

The UN special advisor says the law is of extreme importance, protecting all people in Bosnia, which is not the first country to have such a law.

“I heard allegations that this law has divided people in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Even prior to this law, when I came here, while it was still discussed, people were divided. It is not the law that has divided them,” she said.

Nderitu says all politicians should accept these amendments to the law, as politicians influence the opinion of people and the hate speech they use can encourage the dehumanization of people.

“They are described as sub-humans … And when we dehumanize people in such a way, what happens is that people in the field or people who are mobilized find it easy to attack those persons, because they are dehumanized,” she says. “You no longer feel guilty for what you will do to them, while in fact you will kill them.”

According to the data of the Srebrenica Memorial Center and BIRN’s monitoring, public genocide denial has fallen since Inzko’s intervention, but the State Prosecution still has more than 40 pending reports on minimization or relativization of genocide.

“Politicians will try to force us to be afraid of differences. They will tell us it is not OK to be different, but it is OK. The world has grown up in a world growing in differences. If we were all the same, we would not be able to give our contribution in the same way as we do now,” says Nderitu, adding that she is concerned because today she hears messages similar to those heard before the 1995 genocide

BIRN’s database on Hate Mapping shows that Ratko Mladic, the wartime Bosnian Serb commander sentenced to life for the Srebrenica genocide and other crimes in Bosnia, is still being glorified.

Commenting on the support which Mladic still gets, Nderitu says people act emotionally, adding that this support is a fruit of a kind of collective guilt, which need not exist. “Those convicted were convicted as individuals. No one stood before court for their ethnic or religious community. They were convicted as individuals,” she reminded BIRN.

“There is no such thing as collective guilt, but the crime happened and should not be denied if it was proven in court,” she adds.

Transitional justice is not a one-time event, says Nderitu, explaining that it is necessary to invest in social cohesion. Court processes form part of a broader mechanism that involves building trust, social cohesion, reform of the security sector and all other things necessary for society to move forward.

“Transitional justice is so important and should be planned in long term, not short term,” Nderitu said, trying to explain through the example of post-World War II Germany how trust can be rebuilt.

German school curricula teach the Holocaust and the dangers of Holocaust denial, and the special advisor considers that schools in Bosnia should do likeiwse, and teach about the genocide that happened in Srebrenica.

“Schools in Bosnia and Herzegovina should teach that holocaust happened. (…) It is important that we teach history in a way that helps us prevent the type of crimes brought by war, genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity. It is extremely important for us to teach history in a way that ensures that we have enough knowledge for prevention. And I am saying this knowing that genocide can happen to anyone,” Nderitu concludes.