SARAJEVO, July 4, 2007 (AFP) - Up to 40 million euros will be invested in Srebrenica over the next three years to help the town recover from the 1995 genocide committed there, organizers of a development conference said Wednesday.
Conference organized by the municipal authorities in Srebrenica on Tuesday with support from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), gathered 90 participants, including 17 international donor delegations and representatives of national authorities.
"The conference was up front not designed as a pledging conference however there were a number pledges made," UNDP representative Stefan Priesner told a press conference.
Participants reviewed a set of priority projects for Srebrenica in the areas of infrastructure, social services, return and economic development jointly valued at some 21 million euros.
The conference secured confirmation and pledges for some 40 million euros from national authorities and international donors, including governments of Netherlands, Greece, Pakistan and Canada, Priesner said.
Netherlands was the strongest donor with plans to invest 5 million euros annually, followed by the government of Bosnia's Serb-run part which announced investment of 13 million euros in infrastructure.
At the end of Bosnia's 1992-95 war, Serb forces overran the then UN-protected enclave of Srebrenica, summarily killing some 8,000 Muslims men and boys in Europe's worst atrocity since World War II.
The slaughter is the only episode of Bosnia's bloody war that has been ruled a genocide by the UN war crimes tribunal and the International Court of Justice, both based in The Hague.
Srebrenica's Muslims have intensified calls in recent months for the eastern town to be given a special status and to be put under state jurisdiction.
The Dayton peace accords that ended Bosnia's war created two semi-autonomous entities -- Republika Srpska and the Muslim-Croat Federation -- linked by weak state-level institutions.
sar/adp AFP 041202 GMT 07 07
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