Balkan leaders boycott inauguration in Serbia after genocide denial

Serbia’s Balkan neighbours boycotted president Tomislav Nikolic’s inauguration yesterday, claiming statements by the new Serbian nationalist leader re-ignite wartime tensions and cast doubt over his proclaimed pro-European Union goals.

The leaders of Croatia, Bosnia, Slovenia and Macedonia – the Balkan states that were embroiled in the bloody break-up of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990’s – shunned the ceremonies after Nikolic denied that the Srebrenica massacre, during which Bosnian Serb forces killed some 8,000 Muslim men and boys in 1995, was genocide.

The former Yugoslav neighbours also are angry about Nikolic’s claims that Vukovar, a Croatian town destroyed by Serb forces during Croatia’s war for independence in the 1990s, is actually a Serbian city.

Nikolic’s recent statements have fuelled fears that his surprise victory in a 20 May 20 presidential run-off vote over pro-EU Democratic party leader Boris Tadic may threaten post-war reconciliation in the Balkans - the key condition for Serbia to become a member of the bloc.

“I wanted to send a message (to Nikolic) that his statements about Srebrenica and Vukovar – the statements that remind us of Nikolic from 10-15 years ago– are unacceptable,” Bosnia’s presidency chairman Bakir Izetbegovic said in Bosnian capital, Sarajevo.

“I think that it is important to send such a message straight away because Nikolic is a man who is trying to change.”