Peace and Justice are elusive concepts, so before going any further I am going to define them. In the case of the former Yugoslavia, the mechanism for achieving that peace is the Dayton Accord. Justice, on the other hand, is a more difficult concept to understand. If these concepts are transposed to a former battlefield, a conflict can very quickly develop. Peace, as I have defined it, refers to quiet and tranquillity.
Justice refers to the application of law.
The pursuit of justice can easily disturb the quiet and tranquillity of peace. That, of course is precisely what's happening in the former Yugoslavia. To do so, it is argued by some, would seriously disturb the delicate political balance that has been created by the Dayton Accord. On the other hand, there are those who argue that the perpetrators of war crimes should not be granted any sort of reprieve for the sake of the political process. They argue that justice demands that those indicted by the international war crimes tribunals in the Hague by brought to trial as soon as possible.