Bosnia and Herzegovina

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Thursday 11th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, on this day last week, the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, spoke powerfully in the debate on genocide and atrocity crimes, pledging support for my Genocide Determination Bill, which will be debated on 17 July. Today, as we recall the horrific depredations of the Bosnian genocide and the massacre at Srebrenica, she has eloquently taken us to the current and urgent situation in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

In the context of Putin’s seizure of sovereign territory and illegal attempts to change borders by force, this must surely constitute the most dangerous moment since Dayton. Given Russia’s interference in domestic affairs across so many countries, we need far greater NATO unity in our response and we need to hear more American voices joining ours in insisting that Bosnia’s borders must be guaranteed.

The Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect spells out the risks, including weakness of state structures and institutions, civic space under threat, hate speech, incitement and targeting of specific groups. Republika Srpska has intensified its efforts to erode and undermine the authority of the formal state Government and state-level institutions, including enacting legislation openly challenging the jurisdiction of the constitutional court and other central bodies. Recent trends in nationalist rhetoric, leading to the normalisation of denial of the Srebrenica genocide and narratives exacerbating ethno-nationalist tensions, create a fertile ground for hate-based violence. What are we doing to help strengthen state-level institutions, including by capacity building and monitoring, to accelerate the expeditious prosecution of war crimes without further delays and to support efforts to counter hateful narratives and genocide denialism?

There are new challenges. The Global Centre points to how

“Digital technologies, particularly the rise of generative AI, have accelerated the spread of narratives that weaponise societal grievances, undermine trust in democratic institutions and erode electoral integrity”.


The Joint Committee on Human Rights, which I have the honour to chair, is currently looking at AI and human rights. It is alarming to see how AI could be used to contribute to atrocity crimes or exacerbate the risks thereof.

Can the Minister please tell us when the last joint analysis of conflict and stability was undertaken by the FCDO in Bosnia and how we have used its findings? Can he spell out the role of the FCDO atrocity prevention unit? Following the Bosnian genocide, the 1948 convention on the crime of genocide—given to us by Raphael Lemkin, who gave us the word “genocide”, meaning the cutting of the human family—with its duties to prevent, protect and punish, requires signatories, of which we are one, to look for predictive early warning signs and risk factors. Are we doing that?

We urgently need to agitate for a new high representative, expose the role of corrupt deals and lobbying, uphold sanctions and never forget the consequences when we last looked away. The world’s attention deficit and the temptation for international juggernauts to move on simply will not do.