In July 1995, the town of Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia, declared a UN "safe zone," fell to Bosnian Serb forces led by Ratko Mladić. After the takeover, men and boys were separated from women and children, and over the next few days more than 8,000 were executed. Many bodies were buried in mass graves.
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) have classified the event as genocide. Mladić and Radovan Karadžić were sentenced to life imprisonment for their roles in the crime.
The Srebrenica massacre is recognized as the largest mass killing in Europe since World War II and remains one of the most significant events of the Bosnian war.