TRIALS FOR genocide of former Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic and former president of the breakaway Serb Republic Radovan Karadzic could end up being held jointly in The Hague, the chief prosecutor at the war crimes tribunal has confirmed.
This would place Mladic (69) and Karadzic (66) together in the dock as the alleged military and political masterminds respectively of the Srebrenica massacre in 1995 and the 44-month siege of Sarajevo from April 1992 to February 1996 – two of the worst atrocities of the Bosnian War.
The prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, Serge Brammertz, said he had always believed the best solution would be to have the two men face the charges together – a possibility being described as “the war crimes trial of the century”.
“The charges against both are very similar – one being the alleged political architect and the other being the military leader of the Serbs in Bosnia,” he argued.
Karadzic was arrested in July 2008 and transferred to The Hague a few days later, but his trial for genocide did not begin until October 2009.
Since then, because of a string of legal challenges, relatively little progress has been made.
Gen Mladic was arrested on May 26th after 16 years on the run. He was extradited from Belgrade to The Hague last Tuesday, and refused to enter a plea to the charges against him when he made an initial appearance before the tribunal on Friday.
He now has 30 days in which to enter that plea – and is due before the trial chamber of three judges again on July 4th. “We will examine all the possibilities, a stand-alone trial or a joint or partially joint trial – but it’s still far too early for me to express a final opinion,” Mr Brammertz added.
A lawyer for Karadzic has acknowledged the arrest of Gen Mladic could affect his client’s trial – which was proceeding in courtroom 3 at the tribunal while the general appeared in courtroom 1 on Friday.
American attorney Peter Robinson said in his view the Karadzic case was only 20 per cent complete, and agreed the judges might still decide to try Mladic and Karadzic together. He said Karadzic now had to decide whether to continue with his trial, or ask for it to be stopped so he could work together with Mladic’s defence.
There could however be differences of approach. Karadzic has used his trial to defend a “just and holy” war against the “Islamist goals” of Bosnia’s Muslims. Mladic has appeared to deny personal responsibility and suggest he was following Serb political orders.