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Tribunal to Issue Warrants for Karadzic, Mladic
Prosecutors say the two men masterminded a brutal campaign of genocide and ethnic cleansing in the 43-month Bosnian war.
By Ian Geohegan
The U.N. criminal tribunal for former Yugoslavia is widely expected to reconfirm genocide charges against Bosnian Serb leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic on Thursday and issue international warrants for the two men.
These will make Karadzic and Mladic international fugitives from justice. The tribunal, unable to arrest suspects itself, hopes they will add to the pressure mounting on the two men. Exactly a year after their most heinous alleged crime -- the "disappearance" of thousands of unarmed Muslims after a bloody Serb assault on the U.N. "safe area" of Srebrenica -- Karadzic and Mladic remain at large in the Bosnian Serb republic.
While tribunal prosecutors build a case against suspected war criminals, there is little they can do to get the accused into the dock. With no police of its own, the tribunal has to rely on the former Yugoslav republics or the reluctant NATO-led peace implementation force (IFOR) in Bosnia to make arrests. The tribunal has recently sharpened his criticism of IFOR which, though mandated to detain suspects if its troops encounter them in the course of duty, has avoided actively hunting them down.
International warrants would mean that Karadzic and Mladic could be arrested in any U.N. member country, effectively forcing them to stay within the Bosnian Serb republic. If they move beyond their stronghold of Pale, near Sarajevo, Karadzic and Mladic would risk capture and extradition to The Hague.
Prosecutors say the two men masterminded a brutal campaign of genocide and "ethnic cleansing" in the 43-month Bosnian war. The tribunal first indicted them in July 1995 and, again, last November. It sent warrants to the authorities in Bosnia, rump Yugoslavia -- Serbia and Montenegro -- and the Bosnian Serb republic. Britain, the United States, France and Switzerland subsequently asked for warrants to be sent to them, too. But, while U.N. investigators continue to dig mass grave sites around Srebrenica, amassing evidence that could be used in trials, Karadzic and Mladic play cat-and-mouse with the international community which is desperate to remove them before Bosnian elections in mid-September.
Frustrated by political inertia, the tribunal on Monday concluded two-week public hearings during which prosecutors
aired witnesses' testimony of the savagery of the war conducted by the Bosnian Serbs. In the event of a trial, this evidence evidence would be re-submitted to allow defence lawyers to cross-examine the witnesses. The tribunal has explained that issuing international arrest warrants will have definite consequences for those accused.
Responsibility for arresting them would be extended to the entire world community. Any place giving them shelter would become an "open-air prison." "Any protection he (an accused) enjoys today may transpire to be only temporary," the tribunal warned. |
AMSTERDAM, July 11 (Reuters) - Issuing international arrest warrants against suspected war criminals is unlikely to bring them to trial in The Hague but is expected to add to pressure on the parties in former Yugoslavia to surrender them.
Berserkistan, July 10 · Tribiunal Prosecutes Karadzic, Mladic in Mock Trial
Berserkistan, July 7 · Karadzic, Mladic Know they are Hunted Men
Berserkistan, July 5 · Karadzic’s Lawyers Say He Wants a Fair Trial
Berserkistan, July 2 · Karadzic Practices Psychiatry in Politics
Berserkistan Manhunt! How Much Can NATO Do to Capture Mladic, Karadzic?
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