BIRN Fact-Check: Has Montenegro’s Srebrenica Resolution ‘Stigmatised’ Serbia?

Montenegro's decision to adopt a parliamentary resolution outlawing denial of the 1995 Srebrenica genocide in eastern Bosnia, committed by Bosnian Serbs, has sparked anger among local Serbs and in neighbouring Serbia, with Serbian officials calling for a diplomatic response.

Serbia's President Aleksandar Vucic on Sunday claimed that, by adopting the resolution acknowledging the  Srebrenica massacre as genocide, Montenegro "wanted to leave a stigma, a mark on an entire nation". 

"What interests me is that I tell our people, and I am the President of Serbia, where the largest number of Serbs live … to raise their heads, and the fact that someone has intended to brand them - all of them saying that they do not want to do that, and saying how it is about individuals - but then why didn't you state the names of those individuals when you are already talking about individuals? You deliberately wanted to leave a stigma, a mark on an entire nation," Vucic the told the media on Sunday.

Montenegro's Foreign Ministry denied this in a press release, saying that the resolution "is not, and cannot in any case, be directed against any nation or state, least of all against the Serbian people and the Republic of Serbia. There are no genocidal nations, only individuals, which is clearly and explicitly stated in the text of this document."

BIRN has checked the resolution adopted by the Montenegrin parliament, and notes that it does not say anything explicitly about who committed the genocide, or that the Serbian state and nation was in some sense held responsible.

What the resolution actually says

The eight-point resolution of the Montenegrin parliament "strongly condemns the genocide in Srebrenica" and "acknowledges that genocide took place ...