Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina ? Former President Clinton called for ethnic and religious tolerance Saturday as he joined survivors of Europe’s worst massacre since World War II in opening a memorial center for the victims.

Srebrenica, 50 miles northeast of Sarajevo, had been declared a “safe zone” by the United Nations when it was overrun by Bosnian Serb soldiers in July 1995. The soldiers executed up to 8,000 Muslims, most of them men and boys.

The slaughter has become a symbol for the brutality of Bosnia’s 1992-1995 war, which pitted the country’s Muslims, Orthodox Christian Serbs and Catholic Croats against each other. The war killed 260,000 and forced 1.8 million to flee their homes.

“I hope the very mention of the name Srebrenica will remind every child in the world that pride in our own religious or ethnic heritage does not require or permit us to dehumanize or kill those who are different,” Clinton told an audience of 15,000.

“I hope and pray that Srebrenica will be for all the world, a sober reminder of our common humanity.”

Survivors of the Srebrenica massacre invited Clinton to preside over the opening ceremony because of his crucial role in ending the war. His administration persuaded NATO to bomb Bosnian Serb artillery positions and later brought together the leaders of the warring parties in Dayton, Ohio, to negotiate the peace deal that ended the bloodshed.

“Bad people who lusted for power killed these good people simply because of who they were,” Clinton said.

“They sought power through genocide, but Srebrenica was the beginning of the end of genocide in Europe. It enabled me to secure NATO support for the bombing that led to the peace that put Bosnia-Herzegovina back on the long road to a normal life.”

After his speech, Clinton and top Bosnian and international officials attended the funeral of 107 victims exhumed from mass graves.

So far, 5,000 bodies have been recovered from areas near Srebrenica. Of those, 1,083 have been identified using DNA.

A Bosnian Muslim woman weeps next to the grave of her relative in the foggy morning during a memorial ceremony for 107 identified victims of the Srebrenica massacre in July 1995, which was part of the official opening ceremony of the Srebrenica-Potocari Memorial and Cemetery.