Saturday, 18 July 2009

When "people weren't dying" in Bosnia

According to Sir Malcolm Rifkind, defence secretary under John Major from April 1992- July 1995, on Today this morning, "people weren't dying on a regular basis" in Bosnia during the time he held that post and presided over serial inaction.

Really? Here's what the MoD has to say on the subject:
war broke out on 5 April 1992, when Bosnian Serbs besieged Sarajevo.....by mid 1995 the factions had almost fought themselves to exhaustion and rough equilibrium. NATO launched air strikes against Bosnian Serb positions from late August to mid-September to force them to the negotiating table, and a US brokered cease-fire came into effect on 5 October 1995. The Bosnian death toll after the war was originally estimated at around 200,000 by the Bosnian government. This figure is still often quoted by the Western media. However, the most recent research places the number of victims at around 100,000–110,000 killed (both civilians and military), and 1.8 million forcibly displaced.

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