The remains of 50 recently identified victims of the Srebrenica genocide will be buried on July 11 as Bosnia-Herzegovina marks the 27th anniversary of the killings of thousands of Bosnian Muslim men and boys by Bosnian Serbian forces during the Bosnian war.

More than 3,000 people participated in the March of Peace 2022 on July 10 following a three-day hike to the Potocari memorial cemetery ahead of the ceremony.

Thousands are expected to attend the commemoration, which most Serbs and their leaders refuse to recognize in the ethnically divided country.

Still, in Belgrade, some groups said they will organize a gathering in the Serbian capital with the goal of having July 11 declared as the Day of Remembrance in that country.

In July 1995, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were rounded up and killed by Bosnian Serb forces in the eastern town of Srebrenica -- the worst mass killing in Europe since World War II.

So far, 6,671 people have been identified and buried.

The massacre was labeled as genocide by international courts, but Serbian and Bosnian Serb officials refuse to accept that wording.

The episode came at the end of the 1992-95 Bosnian War pitting the Serbs against Bosniaks and Croats that claimed some 100,000 lives.

Both the wartime Bosnian Serb army commander, Ratko Mladic, and former political leader Radovan Karadzic were subsequently sentenced to life in prison by the UN war crimes court in the Netherlands for genocide in Srebrenica.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and enlargement commissioner Oliver Varhely honored the Srebrenica victims in a joint statement, saying that "we stand together, in grief, with their relatives and friends who survived the genocide."

"It is more than ever our duty to remember the genocide of Srebrenica as part of our common European history...to stand up to defend peace, human dignity, and universal values.”

(Source: Radio Free Europe)