The chief prosecutor of the Hague war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, Serge Brammertz, said on Friday that the glorification of war criminals and denial of war crimes was absolutely unacceptable, praising the adoption of the resolution on the Srebrenica genocide by the Montenegrin parliament.

Reconciliation will not be possible unless those who committed war crimes are prosecuted, Brammertz told a conference on post-war reconciliation and facing the past in the Western Balkans, organised in Podgorica by the Montenegrin non-governmental organisation the Youth Initiative for Human Rights. He addressed the conference via video link.

Brammertz welcomed the adoption of the Srebrenica Resolution by the Montenegrin parliament, which condemns the genocide of Bosniaks in this eastern Bosnian town committed by Bosnian Serb forces in July 1995. He said that the resolution is not a hostile step towards any country or people and that it concerned individual responsibility, adding that he would like other countries to follow Montenegro’s example.

Noting that many war crimes committed in the territory of the former Yugoslavia remained to be prosecuted by national courts, Brammertz indirectly criticised Montenegro for prosecuting only a few war crimes cases.

According to the Montenegrin Special Prosecutor’s Office for Organised Crime and War Crimes, by mid-2020 Montenegro had prosecuted seven war crimes cases, sentencing 11 defendants to prison and acquitting 26.

In this context, the head of the European Union Delegation in Podgorica, Oana Kristina Popa, recalled that last year Montenegro had received files on 15 war crimes cases and expressed hope that investigations would be launched soon.