WHEN POLICY KILLS — U.N. complicity in mass murder in the Balkans:

The Bosnian Muslims were told by the U.N. that they didn’t need weapons of their own; instead, they would have immediate access to the upper echelons of U.N. and NATO “peacekeeping” forces. As noted in U.N. documents, Bosnia-Herzegovina president Izetbegovic “was in favour of the UNPROFOR [United Nations Protection Force] proposal, which, as he understood it, meant that the Bosniacs would hand their weapons over to UNPROFOR in return for UNPROFOR protection.” . . .

By the summer of 1995, the population of Srebrenica, a designated safe area, had swelled with refugees. By the time of the massacre, it was an island of Bosniacs in Bosnian Serb territory — an island the U.N. had sworn to protect.

But the U.N. would not honor its pledge. As the BBC later reported, “A former United Nations commander in Bosnia has told a Dutch parliamentary inquiry into the Srebrenica massacre that it was clear to him that Dutch authorities would not sacrifice its soldiers for the enclave.”

And, indeed, on July 11, 1995, Bosnian Serb forces entered Srebrenica without resistance from Bosniac or U.N. forces; not a shot was fired. (The Bosniac general in Srebrenica had recently been recalled by his government, leaving the Bosniac forces leaderless.) Ethnic cleansing and genocide followed. The men and boys were separated from the women, then taken away and shot.

“Don’t worry — the U.N. will protect you!” Unfortunately, it seems to devote most of its efforts to protecting dictators from the United States. Why, it’s almost as if anti-American dictators are a constituency group within the U.N., while innocent civilians aren’t. Say. . . .

UPDATE: This piece that I wrote a while back is probably relevant enough to link here.