Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte on Saturday apologized for the government's treatment of hundreds of Dutch soldiers who were sent to defend the enclave of Srebrenica during the 1992-95 Bosnian war.

Rutte admitted that the Dutchbat III unit had been given an "impossible task" of keeping the peace in eastern Bosnia without sufficient fire- and manpower.

In July 1995, Bosnian Serb units overran the Dutch UN protection zone at Srebrenica and went on to massacre 8,000 Muslim men and boys.

The peacekeepers, the Dutch government and the United Nations have faced stinging criticism for their failure to prevent the killings.

The Netherlands has always insisted that its lightly armed troops were abandoned by the UN, which provided them no air support.

What did Mark Rutte say?

Rutte addressed Dutchbat III veterans at a military base in the central Netherlands, telling them that after nearly 27 years "some words have still not been said."

"Today, I apologize on behalf of the Dutch government to all the women and men of Dutchbat III. To you and the people who can't be here today," Rutte said. "With the greatest possible appreciation and respect for the way Dutchbat III under difficult circumstances kept trying to do good, even when that was no longer possible."

Rutte noted that the Dutchbat veterans still feel angry about the "lack of mandate, equipment and military support during the deployment; that you were sent on an assignment that gradually proved unfeasible."

Rutte went on to blame Serb leader Radovan Karadzic and then General Ratko Mladic for the genocide. But he said the international community had also failed.

Why did Rutte apologize now?

Saturday's ceremony was organized after a report published last year highlighted the "perceived lack of recognition and appreciation," among Dutchbat veterans over their "near-impossible" peacekeeping mission in Bosnia.

It said many veterans thought they had been abandoned by the government despite suffering psychological trauma over their collective failure to prevent the massacre.

During Saturday's ceremony, Dutchbat soldiers deployed to Srebrenica were also given the Bronze Medal of Honor from Defense Minister Kajsa Ollongren.

What happened at Srebrenica?

Amid an ethnic cleansing operation by the Bosnian Serbs, the UN set up a safe zone at Srebrenica, protected by the Dutch forces.

The area was overrun by thousands of refugees fleeing the war at the same time as more heavily armed Bosnian Serb forces stepped up their shelling of the enclave.

The Dutch forces ejected many of the refugees from their compound in nearby Potocari, where many of the men and boys were separated from the women by Bosnian Serb forces.

The Serbs then went on to murder more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys in what is considered the worst war crime on European soil since World War II.

In 2019, the Dutch Supreme Court ruled that the Netherlands was partially liable for the deaths of about 350 Muslim men, who might have been saved if they had been allowed to shelter in the compound.

The court ruled that Dutch peacekeepers ejected the men from their military base, despite knowing that they "were in serious jeopardy of being abused and murdered" by Bosnian Serb forces.

mm/msh (AP, dpa)