Erdogan’s Srebrenica comment touches new nerve in The Hague Row will remain limited to rhetoric, expert tells Arab News
ANKARA: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s blaming of the Netherlands for the 1995 Srebrenica massacre is the latest development in the row between the two countries.
“We know the Dutch from Srebrenica. We know how bad their characters and nature are,” Erdogan said.
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte reacted by saying: “Erdogan continues to escalate the situation, and it is a repugnant historical falsehood.”
In July 1995, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslims were slaughtered in Srebrenica town by Serbian soldiers.
Dutch soldiers failed to prevent the massacre by ceding control of a safe zone to Bosnian Serb forces.
In 2014, the Netherlands was found liable by a Dutch court over the killings of more than 300 Bosnian-Muslim men and boys, who were handed over by Dutch peacekeepers to Bosnian Serb forces.
Bedrana Kaletovic, a Bosnian woman living in Sarajevo who experienced the civil war, told Arab News that Dutch soldiers did not fulfill their obligation of protection.
However, she expressed displeasure at Bosnia and Herzegovina being dragged into the TurkishDutch row.
Earlier, Ankara banned the Dutch ambassador from entering Turkey and closed the country’s airspace to Dutch diplomats until the Netherlands fulfilled Turkish requests.