Sheehan apologizes for Dutch gays slurBy Mike Corder - The Associated Press
Posted : Tuesday Mar 30, 2010 10:06:14 EDT
THE HAGUE, Netherlands — A retired Marine general has apologized for a remark to the U.S. Senate suggesting that gay Dutch soldiers were partly to blame for the Srebrenica massacre by Serb soldiers in Bosnia, according to the Defense Ministry.
The comment by retired Gen. John Sheehan during testimony opposing a proposal to allow gays to serve openly in the U.S. military caused an uproar in the Netherlands, where discrimination against gays is outlawed, including in the military.
The Defense Ministry released an e-mail Tuesday from Sheehan, a former NATO commander who retired from the military in 1997, to retired Dutch Gen. Henk van den Breemen saying he is sorry for his statements to the Senate Armed Services Committee on March 18.
In the e-mail, Sheehan says the 1995 murder of some 8,000 Muslim men in Bosnia's Srebrenica enclave "was in no way the fault of individual soldiers."
Outnumbered and outgunned by Serb forces, Dutch U.N. peacekeepers did not intervene as Muslim families seeking refuge at Srebrenica were separated and the men driven away to be summarily executed and plowed into mass graves.
Rest of article at:
http://www.navytimes.com/news/2010/03/ap_sheehan_033010/