10/09/2026
"Thank you to the various Bosnian activists, politicians, diplomats and organisations that have worked tirelessly with the British Government for a long time on these matters. This is a great start and a great first statement but it is only the start.
Glorification of Ratko Mladić and men like him hasn't started now, it has been happening since the war ended. Statues, murals, songs. It is decades of normalisation and every time it has gone unanswered, it tells the next generation these men are heroes, and leads us one step closer to repeating what happened in the 1990s.
That's the real danger. It's not one funeral, and it's not just one statement. Politically, far more needs to be done. I'm not a politician but I am an educator and I do believe education is the long-term answer, here in the UK and in the Balkans.
This is the work I do at BGET, and it's why I won't stop doing it. Grateful for this first step. Now let's keep going."
- Smajo Bešo OBE, Founder and Chair of the "Bosnian Genocide Educational Trust", UK
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has today summoned the Serbian Chargé d'Affaires to condemn commemorations surrounding the funeral of convicted war criminal Ratko Mladić.
