The European, 25 September-1 October, 1995. Copyright Bianca Jagger 1997. Posted with the permission of Ms. Jagger

There is official acknowledgment of at least a portion of this direct delivery of men in a restricted memorandum dated 15 July from an Unprofor officer in Tuzla, Ken Biser, who cabled to Zagreb to say that "239 persons, presumable draft-age males were removed [from the Dutch compound] presumable to Batkovici near Bijelina in Bosnian Serb army-controlled territory." He went on to say that "of the 15,000 to 20,000 people in the area outlying Potocari, 7000 were removed."

There is an even more remarkable piece of co-operation between the Dutch and the Serbs. General Van der Wind's debriefing specifies that on the second day of the handover of the Muslims, 13 July, "Dutchbat transferred 30,000 litres of fuel to the BSA [Bosnian Serb Army] in accordance with Mladic's demands". The Dutch were fueling the very vehicles that Mladic used to bring the executioners to Potocari, and the buses that brought their victims to the killing fields.

General Van der Wind argued that Mladic had a hold over the UN Dutch battalion. Professor Mark Almond wrote: "At the same time, the Dutch ministry of defense was busy shredding evidence of its dealings with the Serb general to get its men away, vital video evidence went 'missing' -- thought Serb television showed enough pictures of Dutch officers drinking champagne with Mladic to make one despair at their subsequent promotion in the Nato hierarchy." All this had the hallmarks of a diabolical deal.

Meanwhile, during the delivery of the Muslims by the Dutch to their Serb executioners, Colonel Karremans turned his attention to protecting his own troops.

The debriefing by Van der Wind later explained that the Dutch soldiers who were held by the Bosnian Serbs were repeatedly given a choice: either to return to their posts in Srebrenica or to accompany the BSA. Each time, they chose to go with the Bosnian Serb soldiers.

On 13 July, the Bosnian government warned the world that systematic slaughter was taking place at Srebrenica. Government minister Hasan Muratovic told US Ambassador John Menzies in Sarajevo that more than 1,000 men had been collected in a stadium at Bratunac. That evening, the Bosnian Serbs surrounded a column of men three kilometres long at the village of Glodzanje and took an order from their commander, Major Obrenovic: "You must kill everyone. We don't need anyone alive."

Another order pertaining to a second group of Muslims in flight came from Major General Zivanovic: "The must surrender with all their weapons, then shell the group with all your weapons and destroy it." Yet another group was surrounded in a forest. "Kill them slowly," comes the order from a Serbian codenamed Hawk.

On the same day, Akashi again cabled Annan in New York. He focused on the exodus of women and children to Tuzla, failing to mention the executions. But in a grotesque classic of understatement, he informed his superior that "we are beginning to detect a shortfall in the number of persons expected to arrive in Tuzla. There is no further information on the status of approximately 4,000 draft-age males.

ON 17 JULY, the United Nations-Serbian cabal gathered in Belgrade, just as the summary executions of Muslim males by Mladic's death squads were reaching a bloody climax in Potocari, Karakaj, Nova Kasaba, Kravica and Pilica.

Akashi sent Annan a cable to report that "Carl Bildt [the European Union envoy], Mr. Thorwald Stoltenberg [of the Geneva standing "peace" conference" and myself met in Belgrade with President Milosevic on Saturday 15 July. I was accompanied by General Rupert Smith. Milosevic, at the request of Bildt, facilitated the presence of General Mladic at the meeting. Mladic and Smith had a long, bilateral discussion. Despite their disagreement on several points, the meeting established dialogue between the two generals. Informal agreement was reached on a number of points."

He concluded: "in view of the highly sensitive nature of the presence of Mladic at the meeting, it was agreed by all participants that the fact should not be mentioned at all in public."

Carl Bildt, a former Swedish prime minister, has since discussed this meeting in a briefing, unpublished, given to US daily paper Newsday. "We had to meet with Milosevic." he said, "because he was the only person who could get the two generals [Smith and Mladic] together. Milosevic ordered Mladic to Belgrade.

This leaves little doubt who was pulling the strings, within and without the now ravage enclave of Srebrenica. The point of the meeting, said Bildt, was to arrange access for the International Committee of the Red Cross to an enclave in which, the UN knew well, no Muslims were now living. Bildt made it clear that he knew details of the violence. "There were two categories of atrocities: BSA soldiers taking bottles of slivovitz branding in the evening [of the 11th] and killing and raping women. Ambushes against men escaping into the woods. We knew about men being separated."

Newsday asked Bildt: "Did you raise the issue of massacres with Mladic and Milosevic? "No," replied Bildt. "We had unconfirmed reports of massacres but we didn't raise the issue." Later in the interview he contradicted himself. "Of course we raised these issues," he is quoted as saying.

THE UPSHOT of the meeting was an "agreement" between Smith and Mladic at another rendezvous two days later. Smith's adjutant wrote up the minutes, warning in his cable that "General Smith does not wish the agreement to fall into public domain. We view it as a first, limited step towards a normalisation of relations with the BSA".

The terms of the agreement are well known: the pertain to access for the Red Cross and for "future aid convoys" into what was, by now, a ghost town which was being freely looted and pillaged.

Unprofor's own freedom of movement was high on the agenda, but there was scant mention of the fact that the rattle of the executioner's guns was not beginning to subside because most of the men of Srebrenica were dead.

The minute does, however, record Mladic's chilling, and apparently unchallenged, version of things. He was at pains to point out that Srebrenica was finished in a correct way. He stated: "The population who moved to Potocari were evacuated at their own request and with the full help and co-operation of Unprofor." He accepted that "some skirmishes had taken place, with casualties on both sides", and that some unfortunate incidents had occurred." He had just described to his opposite numbers form the United Nations the most horrific, cold-bloodied mass murder of our age.

The UN listened, impotent . . . complicit? There is no suggestion that Smith had been party to the overrunning of Srebrenica, but what about his superiors, Janvier and Akashi. When Srebrenica was declared a "safe area" in 1993, those who had for 18 months tried to defend the town were obliged to hand over their weapons. In return, they were promise the tutelage and protection of the UN and its professional soldiers. In law, those who are placed in a position of responsibility (not least to the weak and vulnerable) are liable if they fail to fulfill it. Does that premise alone qualify Janvier, Akashi and the UN Dutch battalion's commanders to be considered to stand trial?

But Srebrenica was no isolated butchery. The massacres were the culmination of three years of continuous slaughter, a programme of violence that was exposed to the world. It could, and should have been stopped at any time by the huffing and puffing politicians and diplomats with the authority for clinical air strikes which would have stopped the Bosnian Serb army from its persecution of civilians.

But it was not stopped; the pogrom was deliberately allowed to go on and on, to the debacle at Srebrenica, and beyond. From the international community, there were consistent lies, duplicity, cowardice, intrigue, appeasement and deals; deals like Janvier's treachery at Zvornik, the existence of which Akashi has denied over and over again. Janvier was once asked at a press conference what he thought of Mladic. His reply: "I think he is a professional soldier trying to defend his people."

The international community wants to forget Srebrenica, and it is reluctant to apprehend the war criminals. It knows all too well that to bring to trial those responsible for the massacres will highlight its own liabilities. Indeed, I learnt on my last trip that Karadzic and Mladic have stated privately that they are assembling their defense and are prepared to implicate those who were "complicitous" in their crimes.

The UN, which was supposed to be guarantor of the civilians of Srebrenica, has not seen fit to establish a commission of inquiry to determine whether its personnel should be held accountable for the crimes against humanity and violations of the laws of war. Do Janvier and Akashi share some responsibility with Mladic and Karadzic for the carnage that followed, since they cut deals with the BSA that led to the sacrifice of Srebrenica?

Should the Dutchbat officers and soldiers be brought to trial for delivering the civilians of Srebrenica into the hand of their executioners when they had the mandate and obligation to protect them?

Whey has the French government not set up a commission of inquiry to determine Janvier's share of responsibility in the massacre at Srebrenica. Did his negotiations with Karadzic and Mladic give them the green light to annihilate the enclave? Why has the French government protested the recent action taken by British troops to arrest indicted Serb war criminals.

Why are the US government, the CIA, the State Department, the Pentagon and the National Security Agency suppressing important documents and photographs requested under the freedom of Information Act by human rights organisations, by the Hague War Crimes tribunal and those seeking to establish that Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) violated the Geneva Convention?

Why did the US government keep secret, for almost a month, crucial satellite photographs of men kneeling in the field near Srebrenica awaiting execution when many lives might have been saved if they had been released immediately?

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright recently went to Bosnia for six hours to demand the arrest of war criminals. This is another example of the US Government's double standards. It is up to the US government to set the arrests in motion.

These are all profoundly serious questions that remain unanswered. There will be no lasting peace in Bosnia until he war criminals are apprehended.

The international community from the outset defined the conflict in Bosnia as a "civil war". It prevented the Bosnian government form defending its people through an arms embargo (the only mandate rigorously enforced). It created the treacherous concept of the "safe area" -- nothing other than legitimised concentration camps. It negotiated with and legitimised the position of Slobodan Milosevic, the architect of Greater Serb. It betrayed the people of Bosnia and delivered them to their executioners.

The litany of false promises, hollow threats and betrayal is endless. Were they the product of a deliberate policy of appeasement and collaborations. The arrest of Karadzic and Mladic will be the real test of British prime minister Tony Blair's commitment to put human rights at the top of his foreign policy.

The president of the Hague tribunal, Antonio Cassese, said: "'Trial will establish individual responsibility over collective assignation of guilt, otherwise the entire Serbian nation will bear responsibility for the genocide committed against the Muslim people of Bosnia. We must bring to justice the individual perpetrators. Cassese also said: "justice dissipates the call for revenge because when the court meted out to the perpetrator his just deserts, then the victims' calls for retribution are met. Victims are prepared to be reconciled with their erstwhile tormentors because they know that the latter have now paid for their crimes."

Cassese recalled the annihilated and deportations of the Armenians by the Turks in 1915. The same powers, he said, Britain, Russia and France, had called for those responsible to be tried for their crimes, but they never were. The Armenian massacres became, he said, "the forgotten genocide." He went on: "The result of the immunity of the leaders and organisers of the Armenian genocide is that it gave a nod and a wink to Adolf Hitler, and others, to pursue the Holocaust some 20 years later. Yesterday it was the Armenians and the Jews. Today it is the Muslims in Bosnia, and if there is not calling to account, then it will become another "forgotten genocide". Who knows who will be next.

There will be no lasting peace without justice. If American and European leaders turn their backs on the dead and missing of Srebrenica, they will have traded away everything that democratic nations claim they stand for.

During a recent visit to Bosnia I was repeatedly advised that it was not safe for me to visit Srebrenica. "it is too dangerous. there is a security alert at the moment and it's politically unwise." Of course they do not want someone like me who has so often denounced the atrocities committed in Bosnia to attract attention to this issue. But I am not easily dissuaded. So I went.

I arrived in Srebrenica with a Bosnian translator and a driver. Right away I knew we were entering a forbidden city. People were looking out from their windows shocked to see strangers. There was no question that we all felt apprehensive and the threatened. After the takeover the town was occupied by Serb refugees, some forced to do so by their leaders, other because they had no other place to go. But it was obvious that they were as apprehensive as we were. They perceived us as intruders who wanted to uncover the unspeakable atrocities that had taken place on this soil.

Although Srebrenica is inhabited again, it feels like a ghost town. But the marks of the mortars and shells are only too real. One can almost feel the presence of those massacred. The stench of sewage is still coming from the filthy brook that runs through the town.

I visited the hospital. It lacks some of the most basic medicines. A nurse from Sarajevo explained to me how difficult it was for them to live in this town in abject poverty (forced upon them by their leaders), and to deal with the "lies" that have been told about Srebrenica. I believe that she genuinely thought she was telling the truth -- such is the power of propaganda.

I stopped by the Dutchbat base at Potocari--by the football pitch at Nova Kasaba-- and many other places that were scenes of execution.

For two years I have been haunted by the atrocities perpetrated in Srebrenica. How can I forget those who were executed, massacred, tortured, buried alive. If I forget them, I will be completing their extermination.

How can I forget the grief of the women of Srebrenica: those mothers, daughters, wives, sisters and grandmothers who agonize, not knowing if their loved ones are dead or alive? They need to know the truth, even if it is the brutal certainty that their loved ones are indeed dead, so that they can stop clinging to their vain hopes. They need to come to terms with the pain of reality and be able to mourn them. The women of Srebrenica re convinced that there is a conspiracy on the part of the international community to stall the exhumation and identification process. I believe they are right. In two years, of the 8,000 missing persons, only 800 bodies have been recovered. At that rate it will take 20 years to find the rest.

No, I cannot forget the horrors, the sheer brutality that I witnessed against the Bosnian people. There are images seared into my memory, those of thousands of women victims of mass rapes and abuses, paediatric wards filled with amputee children whose limbs had been blown off by mortar shells, who underwent operations performed without anesthesia, sometimes by medical assistants with a hacksaw; Sabina, the little girl suffering from leukemia who died because Unprofor refused to help me evacuate her from Tuzla, although helicopters were often leaving empty from the airport.

I cannot forget the testimonies of unspeakable atrocities that describe the strategy of "ethnic cleansing". I cannot forget the look in the eyes of Hasan, a young Bosnian who worked for Dutchbat -- a survivor of Srebrenica who is still desperately searching for his family two years later, despite the fact that his father, mother and brother were among the 239 people delivered the by the Dutch battalion commander directly to the BSA and never seen again.

Throughout the conflict and its aftermath, there are those who have advocated a policy of neutrality and inaction in Bosnia because they argue, it keeps the blood of our hands. The blood may not be on our hands, but it is already on our conscience. Dante wrote: "The darkest place in Hell is reserved for those who, in a period of crisis, claim neutrality." Bosnian has been a failure of our morality. It has also been an indictment of international law and order.

The real question is how we will live with the blood of Bosnia on our conscience after working so hard to keep it off our hands. The world is a different place because of what has happened in Bosnia. Confidence in some of our most trusted institutions has been shattered. Our hopes for the post-Cold War era have been cast into doubt. Is the New World Order?

Perhaps the biggest irony of all is that if we fail, the victims are not just he Bosnia people who died from violence and indifference but also ourselves.

The message will not be lost on those who challenge international justice and international order, from Rwanda and East Timor to Guatemala and Tibet. If we let that happen, may God forgive us all.