Srebrenica nestles in a lush green valley among mountains that rise from the banks of the River Drina. But, in July 1995, Srebrenica had been a living hell for three years. In the spring of 1992, Bosnian Serb troops launched a campaign of violence in pursuit of a racially pure statelet, after multi-ethnic Bosnia voted for independence from Yugoslavia. Entire villages were eradicated, towns torched, their populations killed or driven out by ethnic cleansing.

Survivors fled into three eastern enclaves where the Bosnian republican army had resisted, one of which was Srebrenica. It was declared a safe zone by the UN, causing the population of Srebrenica to swell from 9,000 to 42,000. Under the direction of President Radovan Karadžić, General Ratko Mladić entered Srebrenica on 11 July 1995. He declared on tv that he was going to take revenge for a violent suppression of a Serb uprising that happened in Srebrenica in 1804. Fearing genocide, thousands of Bosnian Muslim men and boys tried to make the 63-mile trek to safety. Mladić’s troops blocked roads, carried out ambushes and used stolen UN vehicles and uniforms to trick Bosnian Muslims into surrendering. Men and boys aged 12 to 77 were separated from the others. Truckloads of those men and boys, blindfolded, their arms tied, were lined up by the gunmen in fields and forests, sometimes told to pray and then shot dead. The killing, systematic and methodical, lasted four days. Those unarmed men and boys were killed just because of who they were: Bosnian and Muslim. They came to a mass grave in trucks and were buried with bulldozers, all within a UN safe haven that failed to protect innocent people. The only survivors were those who hid under dead bodies and crept away once night had fallen.

During our visit, we had the privilege of meeting a survivor, Nedžad Avdić. After the fall of Srebrenica, Nedžad and many other Bosniak men tried to flee through the nearby woods in an attempt to reach territory controlled by the Bosnian army where they could be safe. Nedžad was captured together with the other Bosniaks and was then transported to a village and locked up in a school building. Nedžad said, ‘We heard screams and cries. The classrooms were overcrowded. No water. No air. We drank our own urine in order to survive. People died of heat, literally’. When the massacre started, Nedžad only survived by lying motionless and wounded in a tangle of bodies until the killers moved away.

In 1995, I was 17—the same age as Nedžad. I remember, like many, the horrific news stories on tv about the war. A vivid image sticks with me of a young man wheeling an elderly man in a wheelbarrow across mountains for days, fleeing for their lives. Twenty-one years later, I walked around that battery factory at Potočari, which was the UN base fatally abandoned by the Dutch peacekeepers where thousands were slaughtered: an empty, sterile, quiet space, but with an eerie feeling of what took place—the desperate fears of those packed into the room with no escape, no food, no water, knowing they were about to die. Opposite, stand thousands of uniform bright white headstones, each marking a life callously taken too soon. Most of the town’s former Muslim residents are either dead or have emigrated. Though international courts have recognised the Srebrenica massacre as genocide, this is still denied by Serbia and Bosnian Serbs.

Nedžad returned to Srebrenica in 2007 and lives there with his family. A startling fact to all of us on the delegation is that the education fails to teach the history of what happened at Srebrenica. Nedžad says, ‘They’re being taught that the genocide never happened. You turn on the tv and it’s like the war never ended. I fear for my daughters’ future. The education system generated new hatred and indoctrination. Despite everything, I hope that I can teach my daughters to grow up without hatred. This will be my success.’

The US-brokered Dayton accords that ended the war set up an intricate federal structure with a weak central Government. For Nedžad, the greater injustice is that the division of Bosnia into two halves—a Muslim-Croat federation and a Serbian republic—has meant that the practice of ethnic cleansing has been legitimised. Many regularly see the killers around the town. Some hold offices in local government. Others are senior figures in the local police force. Last October, Srebrenica elected a Serbian mayor with an ultranationalist history who does not accept that the Srebrenica massacres amounted to genocide—something that seems unimaginable to us.

While the genocide took husbands, sons and brothers, their mothers, daughters and sisters were left behind. Once a year, the Mothers of Srebrenica, who campaign to ensure each person responsible is brought to justice, host a ceremony to remember their loved ones. This intensely moving event is held in the Potočari cemetery, where some of the victims whose bodies have been found are buried. We had the privilege of meeting some of the Mothers of Srebrenica. They want to share their story with young children so that they can learn from the past and also prepare for the future. Those who killed believed they could get away with murder. They thought they could erase the identity of their victims permanently. But they were wrong.

While we were in Bosnia we also saw the invaluable work undertaken by the International Commission for Missing Persons. The ICMP spearheaded the effort to locate and identify the people who went missing during the conflict. In the aftermath of Srebrenica, work began on what were thought to be the five mass burial sites, each containing many separate graves in which the dead had been buried and left hidden. However, testing showed that body parts from what came to be called the primary graves had been moved to secondary ones, to hide evidence. Sometimes, they had even been disinterred and reinterred again, into tertiary graves. This had two implications: first, that more than a million and a half bones and body parts from over 8,000 people were scattered across countless sites; and the second, that the few byways of rural eastern Bosnia had for weeks—months, even—been heaving with trucks carrying the rotting, stinking remains of these people, yet no one said a thing.

Edin Ramulic, of an organisation called Izvor, which campaigns with relatives of the missing, said:

They drove past people’s houses along quiet roads. For every one missing person, at least three people know exactly where they are buried—the driver, the digger, and the policeman, plus whoever saw them pass—but all remain silent. While that silence persists, you cannot call this peace.’

Through the work of the ICMP, more than 70 per cent of those people have been accounted for. Furthermore, the scientific evidence of the identity of victims from Srebrenica made it possible to piece together an incontestable narrative of crimes and to present this evidence in numerous trials including those of Radovan Karadžić and Ratko Mladić.

When we remember what happened in Srebrenica it’s also important to remember those others who were targeted. The youngest victim of Srebrenica was a baby girl called Fatima, born in the UN base at Potočari. Fatima was just two days old when she was murdered. Thousands of women, children and elderly people were forcibly deported and a large number of women were raped. The use of rape as a weapon of war is one of the most harrowing and most savage crimes against civilians. The war in Bosnia took sexual violence to new levels. The UN estimates up to 50,000 women and girls, some as young as 12, were raped as part of an organised ethnic cleansing regime. We do not know the exact number because the majority have remained silent through stigma, shame and fear.

Many children born of rape have grown up isolated and rejected from society, and this is something that is still not talked about. Pramila Patten, the UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict, said:

Rape is a cruel weapon that is as devastating as any bullet or bomb. It ravages victims and their families. It destroys communities, and undermines their chances for reconciliation if left unaddressed. It has also been described as the oldest and yet least condemned crime of all.’

Many women suffered, and now we know many men have suffered from this crime too. Some 3,000 men and boys were raped during the war. Many of the victims have been isolated and shunned by their own families and communities.

Last month, in a bid to promote reconciliation, leaders of the Orthodox, Islamic, Jewish and Catholic communities signed a declaration denouncing the stigmatisation of survivors of conflict related sexual violence at Bosnia’s inter-religious council. This declaration is the first of its kind in the world.

What happened in Srebrenica was not inevitable; it was preventable. While those survivors mourn the loss of their loved ones and we say ‘never again’, we all have a responsibility to ensure future generations understand how neighbour turned against neighbour, tolerance turned to intolerance and similarities were shunned for differences. Never has it been more important to learn the lessons from Srebrenica. We have a duty to remember those who died and those left behind, but we also have a duty and responsibility to work harder than ever to challenge those ideologies of fear and hatred. Most importantly, we must teach the next generation about what happened in Srebrenica and the dangers of not tackling hatred and intolerance. I would urge other Members to visit Srebrenica, read the testimonies from the survivors and do all we can to bring communities together and stand up to those who try to divide us.

Furthermore, I’d ask the leader of the house and the Cabinet Secretary for Education to support the education programme launched by Remembering Srebrenica to ensure that pupils in schools in Wales understand the steps that led to genocide. It also gives us the opportunity to show what can happen if we let hate win.

I shall never ever forget the day that I heard the stories of those people who were at Srebrenica and those who lost their loved ones. Their dedication and courage in telling the world what happened cannot be underestimated. Their voices are so powerful and dignified. Every time I listen to them, I feel captivated, ashamed that the world allowed this to happen, and inspired to do something. Our guide Rashad states: ‘Unfortunately, in Bosnia we have three histories, and the most dangerous one is the narrative that kids get from their home. Only by listening to the life stories and remembering what happened can we understand how people can contribute to a better society.’

We’re told to learn from our past mistakes, yet it’s evident that we didn’t. We owe it to the people of Srebrenica. We must remember Srebrenica.