The Hague, Netherlands
The International Court of Justice opened hearings this week into charges of genocide against Serbia and Montenegro during the 1992–95 war in Bosnia. The case marks the first time the World Court has been asked to rule on genocide alleged against a sovereign state, rather than an individual. Bosnia first brought the charge against what was then Yugoslavia in 1993, when Serbian militias were engaged in a violent ethnic cleansing campaign against Bosnian Muslims. But the matter bogged down in legal wrangling. The case focuses on the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica, an event that the World Court has already termed genocide.
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