A group of women victims of Bosnia's 1990s war pressed charges on Thursday against organisers of a rally glorifying Ratko Mladic, the wartime army chief given life in prison over war crimes, including genocide.
The "Women -- victims of war" association pressed criminal charges with the country's general prosecutor for "incitement to national, racial or religious hatred" during the rally held Monday to mark Bosnian Serbs' "national day", they said in a statement.
The event, held on the infamous Visegrad bridge across the Drina river in eastern Bosnia, was organised by Bosnian Serb fans of the Red Star Belgrade football club, local media reported.
At the start of Bosnia's 1992-1995 war Bosnian Serb forces killed more than 1,500 civilians, mostly Muslim, in the Visegrad area, according to Bosnia's Institute for Missing Persons.
Numerous crimes were committed on the bridge itself, according to survivors' testimonies.
Bosnia's 1992-1995 war claimed nearly 100,000 lives. It left the country split into two highly autonomous entities -- a Serbs' Republika Srpska and a Muslim-Croat Federation.
During Monday's rally a large canvas with a printed wartime Bosnian Serb forces officer's cap, often used to represent Mladic, was displayed at the stone bridge, images posted on social networks showed.
The crowd chanted Mladic's name, sang songs glorifying him and lit torches.
A UN war crimes court sentenced Mladic to life in prison, notably for the 1995 genocide in Srebrenica.
Around 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were executed by Bosnian Serb forces, that Mladic commanded, after they captured the eastern town.
Tensions have been rising in Bosnia in recent days sparked by controversial celebrations in the Serbian entity of its "national day", that local justice deemed anti-constitutional.
Several incidents were reported, targeting Muslims living in the Serb entity or Serbs living in the Bosnian-Croat half.
The office of the top international envoy to Bosnia, tasked with overseeing the civilian aspects of the peace deal that ended the 1992-1995 war, warned against "regrettable incidents ... fuelled by increased nationalistic discourse".
The US embassy strongly condemned acts of "violence and intimidation" as did the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
The latter urged local authorities to prosecute the perpetrators and protect victims and their communities.