Dutch prime minister apologises to Srebrenica peacekeepers

Mark Rutte addressed hundreds of veterans of the Dutchbat III peacekeeping unit on Saturday

Bosnian Serb army Commander General Ratko Mladic, left, drinks with Dutch UN Commander Tom Karremans, second right, in Potocari, three miles north of Srebrenica, on July 12 1995 (AP)

The Dutch government has formally apologised to soldiers who were sent as UN peacekeepers to defend the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica during the Bosnian war in 1995 with insufficient firepower and personnel.

The soldiers – now veterans – were over-run by more heavily armed Bosnian Serb forces led by Gen Ratko Mladic who went on to massacre 8,000 Muslim men and boys in July 1995, in a bloodbath that an international war crimes tribunal labelled genocide.