The Barack Obama administration came to this decision a week after Jordanian Ambassador to the UN, Prince Zeid Ra'ad Zeid Al-Hussein, a former UN official in Bosnia during the 1990s said he would boycott the debate.

Former Serbian Foreign Minister Jeremic has been presiding over the UN General Assembly since June last year. He was not pleased with the acquittal of Croatian generals by the ICTY earlier this year and has convened the debate. The date for the debate, the portal recalls, falls on the 71st anniversary of the founding of the Independent State of Croatia (NDH) which has led to opinion amongst many delegates that Jeremic intends to exploit the event to criticise the ICTY.

Zeid has said that he was concerned Jeremic would make use of the debate to minimise the crimes committed by Serbs in the wars in the 1990s.

"I was in the former Yugoslavia from 1994-1996 and, in view of what I know to be true, will also, together with my delegation, be nowhere near the event," Zeid told Turtle Bay last week. " We will encourage other delegations in the coming days to do likewise" Zeid told the blog.

Zeid said that Jeremic had denied a request by the Mothers of Srebrenica, a Bosnian human rights group that represents victims of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre to address the UN General Assembly, though he did invite them to attend. Instead, the group will hold a press conference at U.N. headquarters sponsored by the governments of Jordan and Liechtenstein.

Bosnia will be represented by the Serb member and chairman of Bosnia's three-member state presidency, Nebojsa Radmanovic who admitted that an agreement on the speech to be given in New York was hard fought.