SERBIA:The UN war crimes tribunal sentenced former Yugoslav army officer Mile Mrksic to 20 years in prison yesterday for the massacre of 194 people in the Croatian town of Vukovar in 1991.
A second ex-officer, Veselin Sljivancanin, was sentenced to five years for torture but cleared of the most serious charges against him, while a third ex-officer, Miroslav Radic, was cleared of all charges.
Prosecutors had tried to prove the three men were responsible for the killing of at least 264 people - who had sought shelter in Vukovar's hospital early in the 1991-95 war - and had sought life sentences for all three.
The killings became notorious as one of the most brutal episodes of the Balkan wars. The court ruled that the three
were not criminally responsible, although Mrksic (60) had in effect allowed the killings to happen because he knew the detainees were at high risk if he left them in the hands of Serb paramilitaries.
When Vukovar fell to Yugoslav forces after a siege, many people fled to the hospital expecting to be evacuated in the presence of international observers. But Serb-dominated local army units and militias seized several hundred of them and took them to a farm where they were beaten and shot dead. Their bodies were then dumped into a mass grave.
Prosecutors argued that this group were largely civilians, but the judges ruled that members of the Croatian forces were also hiding in the hospital, pretending to be patients or hospital staff. Those taken from the hospital were seized because they were suspected Croatian fighters, the court said, adding that they therefore had prisoner of war status.
As a result, the tribunal dismissed charges of crimes against humanity against the three accused, including the charge of extermination, which applies to offences against civilians. The judges also threw out the prosecutors' argument that the three accused had intended to murder some of those in the hospital all along.
"In essence the allegation is that the three accused men acted together to achieve the murder of the prisoners of war from the hospital and their mistreatment. There is no direct evidence which establishes this," said Judge Kevin Parker.