ISTANBUL / Anadolu

Turkish President's wife Emine Erdogan commemorated the victims of the Srebrenica genocide committed by Serbian forces against Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1995.

She made the statement in a post on the Turkish social media platform 'In Social' on Saturday, on the 31st anniversary of the genocide that claimed more than 8,000 lives.

Emine Erdogan said, 'Commemorating Srebrenica is not only about sadness, but about keeping conscience alive so that humanity is not dragged into the same darkness again.'

She prayed for the victims of the Srebrenica genocide, referring to them as 'our Bosniak brothers,' and wished patience for their families and loved ones.

The Srebrenica massacre is considered the worst in Europe after World War II, as Bosnian civilians from Srebrenica on July 11, 1995 sought protection from Dutch soldiers after Serbian forces under Ratko Mladic captured the town.

However, the Dutch forces, part of a UN contingent, handed them over to Serbian forces, who then carried out a massacre in which more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were killed.

During the Bosnian War, which started in 1992 and ended in 1995 after the Dayton Agreement, Serbian forces also committed numerous massacres against Muslims, causing the deaths of more than 300,000 people, according to UN figures.

The Serbs buried the Bosnian victims in mass graves. After the war, Bosnia launched efforts to search for the missing and exhume bodies from mass graves to identify them.

Bosnian authorities annually on July 11 rebury a group of identified victims at the Potocari Memorial Cemetery.