AfD sign in the Bundestag in debate about Srebrenica

In the Bundestag there was a scandal in the debate to commemorate the genocide of Srebrenica. Speeches from AfD politicians triggered protest and shaking heads in the other factions. Federal Foreign Minister Johann WadePhul (CDU) stepped unplanned to the speaker desk.

30 years after the war crimes in the Bosnia War, the Bundestag had interrupted the ongoing budget consultations for a memorial debate. “Srebrenica was the worst war crime on European soil since the Second World War,” said Bundestag President Julia Klöckner (CDU) at the start. The genocide was also a failure of the United Nations, the peace troops of which would have no protection for those seeking protection.

The AfD MP Alexander Wolf then criticized the classification of the war crime as a genocide and said, “the Serbs shot men there, fundamentally spared women and children”. The culture of remembrance that is forced to impose the already fragile state of Bosnia-Herzegovina from outside does not contribute to the opening of the tensions in the state.

The statements criticized the speakers sharply. The SPD politician Siemtje Möller said that international courts had found in several judgments that it was clearly a genocide. The CDU foreign politician Jürgen Hardt accused Wolf of denying the genocide: “For him, the genocide of Srebrenica may be a fly shot at the beam history and he stands to the side of the perpetrators and not to the sacrifices.”

There was later loud protest when AfD MEP Martin Secures his speech, especially for domestic topics that are important to the AfD. “What can be seen in the Great in the Yugoslavia War can be experienced in almost every school yard in Germany in the little ones,” he said. “Srebrenica warns us to end multiculturalism before it is too late”. Demonstratively turned MPs from the SPD and left. Klöckner warned him to speak about the topic.

Foreign Minister Johann WadePhul (CDU) unplanned after the AfD speeches. The Bundestag discussed the recognized genocide, he also said to the guests in the stands: “And I regret that we put up with the victims to the relatives, especially here and the ambassador of the ambassador,” he added. For the federal government, he said: “Of course we recognize this genocide.”

On July 11, 1995, Bosnian Serbs had conquered the Muslim Enklave Srebrenica declared the UN Protection zone in the course of the Bosnia War. The day and in the following days, around 8,000 people were murdered, in the majority men and male teenagers. Women, girls and children were deported to the front line in buses to the area controlled by the Bosnian army. The judgments of the war criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Court of Justice (IGH) have legally determined the genocide character of the Srebrenica massacre.