A former Bosnian Serb police chief who beat a man for an hour until he died and forced prisoners into sexual practices with each other received a 10year jail sentence from the UN war crimes tribunal yesterday.
The court found Stevan Todorovic (43) guilty of crimes against humanity for his role in the ethnic cleansing campaign in northern Bosnia in 1992 and 1993.
The accused had pleaded guilty as charged.
Todorovic had admitted that while police chief in the town of Bosanski Samac he had participated in the persecution of the non-Serb population, including cruel and inhumane treatment, murder, sexual violence, physical torture and deportations.
The court was told how the accused, nicknamed "Monstrum", had forced prisoners to practise fellatio on each other after having been beaten.
The judgment likewise recalled how Todorovic had personally beaten a man for an hour at police headquarters, shortly after which the victim had died.
Todorovic was appointed police chief after the Bosnian Serbs seized Bosanski Samac on April 17th, 1992, and drove out all but 300 of the city's pre-war Muslim and Croat population of 17,000, according to the prosecution.
The judgment read out by the court president, Mr Patrick Lipton Robinson, emphasised the gravity of Todorovic's crime, especially "the cruel manner in which he perpetrated several of the criminal acts underlying his conviction."
But it cited extenuating circumstances, namely the accused man's remorse and willingness to co-operate with the court.
"The trial chamber must be satisfied as to the sincerity of the expressed remorse," the judgment said.
"It recognises the considerable contribution of Todorovic's guilty plea to the efficiency of the work of the ICTY."
Mr Lipton Robinson acknowledged Todorovic's decision in December to plead guilty to crimes against humanity in exchange for guarantees from the prosecution that they would seek a lesser sentence of between five and 12 years in prison.
The plea-bargaining deal also put an end to contention over the circumstances of Todorovic's arrest.
He originally protested that he had been kidnapped and handed over to the NATO-led Sfor stabilisation force in Bosnia. His lawyers had originally accused Sfor of involvement in illegal acts.
The former Yugoslav president, Mr Slobodan Milosevic, awaiting trial at the UN tribunal on war crimes charges, received legal advice yesterday from a former US attorney general, Mr Ramsey Clark, a major critic of the tribunal.
Mr Clark, attorney general in the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson in the 1960s, has called for the International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) to be scrapped.