Thousands of Bosnian Muslims returned under US armed guard today to the site of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre to launch a memorial to the worst single atrocity in Europe since World War Two.
Relatives of the dead knelt to pray in the field opposite the former battery factory in the Srebrenica suburb of Potocari, where a lightly-armed Dutch UN force had watched helplessly as Serb forces took away Muslim men and boys six years ago.
Bosnian Serb police stood guard nearby, UN police escorted the mourners and heavily armed US peacekeepers were out in force on the way to the field, due to become a graveyard for some of the 8,000 people who were reported missing.
They were apparently killed in cold blood after being driven away in buses, or as they tried to flee Srebrenica after nationalist Serb forces overran it despite its wartime status as a UNsafe area .
Only half the remains have so far been found, but more are being discovered all the time. The NATO peacekeepers were deployed to deter possible assaults by Serbs angry at being blamed for the bloodletting.