It is not necessarily pejorative to describe as a mantra the current custom of repeating optimistic messages about the European prospects of the Western Balkans; a mantra may be a positive thing, focusing the mind on what lies ahead.
 
In the Western Balkans, however, memories are powerful and often painful. For every gathering, such as those in recent times in Sarajevo and in Dubrovnik to discuss the European prospects of the region, there is another, such as the gathering to remember the dead of Srebrenica.

Speaking to Bulgarian news agency BTA on July 10 at the close of the two-day summit of leaders from South Eastern Europe in Dubrovnik, Bulgarian Foreign Minister Nikolai Mladenov said: "We went beyond what had been discussed in Sarajevo in early June, the reaffirmation of the European perspective for the Western Balkans. Participants rallied behind the idea that internal reforms by our neighbours are key to their EU accession".

Some reports from Dubrovnik hailed the gathering as one of the most successful of its kind so far, in terms of the rank of those in attendance.

Prime Minister of Bulgaria Boiko Borissov; of France, Francois Fillon; of Poland, Donald Tusk: of Slovenia, Borut Pahor, of Albania, Sali Berisha; Hashim Thaci of Kosovo; Croatian prime minister Jadranka Kosor.

Borissov told the summit that, even though the Western Balkans were not yet part of the EU, every country in the region shared common challenges with Europe – the global financial crisis, organised crime, illegal trafficking of people, weapons and drugs. Dealing with these issues required strong political will and very fine co-ordination among the services, he said. It would be naïve to assume that each country could cope on its own, and it was precisely because of this that it was important for all the region’s countries to join a common structure such as the EU.
 
A place at the table
But there was, so to speak, an empty chair in Dubrovnik.

As has become customary, Serbia declined to attend because of what it saw as the status accorded to Kosovo’s head of government, Thaci. Belgrade rejects Kosovo’s independence as illegitimate and refuses to participate in any gathering where, in the view of Serbia, Kosovo is being treated as an independent state instead of being represented through the UN Mission.

It was a reminder that some individual countries in the Western Balkans have a long way to go in finding a modus vivendi bilaterally, let alone in the context of the European future to which all aspire in their stated policies.

For the host country, the summit was a well-timed boost, against the background of the resumption of its EU negotiations accession process.

But for all the countries, the same span of days in July held a reminder of where those constituent states of the former Yugoslavia had come from, when talk of European prospects may have seemed only a distant dream.
 
A place of mourning
It is 15 years since the mass murder of about 8000 people at Srebrenica. As noted by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network’s Justice Report, those so far who have been found guilty of involvement in the killings have been sentenced to a total of 476 years in prison, including two life sentences.

There are fugitives still at large, household names such as Ratko Mladic, others less well-known. The much-spoken-of European prospects of some Western Balkan states are tied in part to these fugitives being brought to international court.

"We are here to honour the memory of the victims," Greek alternate foreign minister Dimitris Droutsas, one of those who attended a July 11 funeral service and memorial, said. "What occurred here must never happen again".

Earlier this year, Serbia's parliament voted to apologise to the victims of the massacre --and for not doing enough to stop it.

A monument made of discarded shoes was erected, an acting of mourning but also meant to symbolise an indictment against the United Nations because of a failure by its peacekeepers to stop the massacre.

As reported by the Voice of America, Women in Black Co-ordinator Stasa Zajovic, co-ordinator of the activist group Women in Black, said that it was crucial that Serbs never forget that Bosnian Serb forces killed Muslims, after they overran the Bosnian town of Srebrenica. 

"Shoes represent the mark left by the people of Srebrenica," she said. "Their presence in our lives."

Survivors are also angry, VOA reported, that Bosnian Serb commander Mladic remains at large. On July 9, excerpts of Mladic's diaries were published, recording details of secret deals with Bosnian Croats to divide Bosnia-Herzegovina and expel the Muslim population in the early 1990s. 

Bulgaria’s Foreign Minister Mladenov was among those who attended the funeral, of 775 recently-identified victims who were interred at the ceremony.

In the book of condolences, Mladenov quoted Martin Luther King: "I will not remember the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends".