Goran Lajic, Arrested near Nuremberg,
Charged with Killing, Torture at Prijedor
THE HAGUE, May 13 (Reuters) — The U.N. criminal tribunal for former Yugoslavia said on Monday that it took custody of a Bosnian Serb charged with war crimes against Muslims and Croats at the Keraterm prison camp in Prijedor in northwest Bosnia. Goran Lajic, 28, was arrested on March 18 near Nuremberg by German police acting on a tip-off from Interpol.The tribunal said in a statement that Lajic had been transferred by German authorities to The Hague and would appear before tribunal judges at 0830 GMT on Friday to enter a plea. His transfer brings to five the number of suspected war criminals held at the tribunal's 24-cell detention unit.
Lajic, a camp guard or interrogator, is one of 13 Serbs charged with atrocities at Keraterm, a former ceramics factory. The tribunal alleges that between May and August 1992 Serb forces rounded up more than 3,000 Muslims and Croats from the Prijedor district and imprisoned them at Keraterm. "Detainees were killed, sexually assaulted, tortured, beaten and otherwise subjected to cruel and inhuman treatment," it said in its July 1995 indictment. "Hundreds were killed."
"Severe beatings were commonplace. One count charges that some of the accused were involved in the firing of machine guns and heavy calibre guns into a room filled with at least 140 detainees who all died." Lajic is personally charged with killing five prisoners.
The tribunal, set up by the U.N. Security Council three years ago, is the first international body for prosecuting war crimes since the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials in the 1950s. It has so far indicted 57 suspects for war crimes.
Its first trial, of Bosnian Serb paramilitary Dusan Tadic, moved into its fifth day on Monday, with the prosecution's first "expert" witness, British historian Dr James Gow, under cross-examination from Tadic's lawyers. The trial is expected to last several months.
The Prijedor Report Final report of the United Nations Commission of Experts
Berserkistan May 10 · First Muslim Before Tribunal Pleads Not Guilty
Berserkistan May 9 · Historian Takes Stand for Second Day In Trial of Dusan Tadic
Berserkistan May 8 · Historian Sets Context for Atrocities in Day 2 of Tadic Trial
Berserkistan May 8 · Muslims in Sarajevo React to Tribunal Trial
Berserkistan May 7 · Defense: Tadic Had No Role in Murder, Torture
Berserkistan May 7 · On Trial's Eve, Tadic Claims Innocence
Berserkistan May 7 · Childhood Friend Says Tadic was Cruel, Artistic
Berserkistan May 7 · Tribunal Judge Heavy on Texas Style
Key Facts about the War Crimes Tribunal
War Crimes Profile: Dusan Tadic
International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia
The United Nations
Coalition for International Justice
Reports concerning human rights abuses in Bosnia
Intac Access
Major War Criminals/Suspects
CalTech's Bosnia Site
Reports on War Crimes in the Former Yugoslavia
CalTech's Bosnia Site
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