US, UK, France behind 1995 massacre of Bosnia Muslims: Report

Newly revealed documents from the 1990s Bosnia war and the carnage of Muslims there by Serbian death squads show that the US, Britain and France were behind the worst massacre in Europe since World War II.

A new investigation on how the massacre of over 8,000 Muslim Bosnian boys and men came about shows that British, American and French governments were prepared to cede UN-protected safe areas to armed Serb militias during the war in Bosnia.

The Serb death squads butchered male Bosnians in Srebrenica over the course of four days in July 1995 and the new details about the massive genocide by the Serbs emerge 20 years later, just prior to events marking its anniversary.

According to declassified US cables, cited in a Saturday report by the UK-based daily The Guardian, details of the killings reached Western intelligence agencies and decision-makers soon after the carnage began on July 13, 1995.

"CIA operatives watched almost 'live' at a satellite post in Vienna. From that day, spy planes caught what was happening. Standing men held by armed guards. Later pictures showed them lying in the fields, dead," added the report, quoting one of the cables.

The report quoted a senior US State Department official as saying that “all US partners were immediately informed,” but the slaughter went on with no attempts to deter the killers, or to locate the victims.

According to the UK daily, a day after the carnage, the UN Security Council said it feared "grave mistreatment and killing of innocent civilians." The council had received "reports that 4,000 men and boys had gone missing."

However, The Guardian report said, "the diplomats continued business as usual."

The bloodshed took place after Bosnian Serbs ran over the Bosnian town, even though it was formally declared a UN-protected area.

The declassified cables also unveiled that prior to the massacre, Washington called on the so-called UN peacekeeping forces in Srebrenica to pull back from safe areas, a decision backed by Paris and London.

Moreover, former Dutch Defense Ministry officials have stated that the UN provided 30,000 liters of fuel gas to Serbs, facilitating the takeover of Srebrenica and the brutal carnage there.

All the decisions adopted by Western leaders prior to the massacre came with the clear knowledge that Serb leaders had pledged to uproot Muslims even if there was "blood up to their knees."

Meanwhile, the genocide was never mentioned in the peace negotiations with the Serb leaders. The new revelations pose a serious challenge to the official Western version of events that has long described the Srebrenica massacre as a shocking and unforeseen incident.

MFB/HSN/SS

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