BOSNIA: The wife of Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect Dr Radovan Karadzic, who has fiercely defended him during his decade on the run, publicly urged him to surrender for the first time last night.
Ljiljana Karadzic said her family was being put under unbearable strain by Nato troops who regularly raided the family's houses and who detained the couple's son, Aleksandar, for 10 days of questioning earlier this month.
"That is why I had to make a choice between my loyalty towards you and towards the children and grandchildren - and I have made it," Ms Karadzic told Bosnian television, speaking slowly and often pausing for breath.
"It is painful and difficult for me to plead with you. However, I am pleading with you, with all my heart and soul, to surrender."
Her appeal came 10 years after the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague indicted the former poet, children's author and Bosnian Serb leader for genocide during a 1992-1995 war against the former Yugoslav republic's Muslims and Croats.
This month's anniversary of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, when forces led by Dr Karadzic's ally Gen Ratko Mladic murdered some 8,000 Muslim men and boys, increased pressure on Bosnia's Serbs and Serbia-Montenegro to catch the men.
Balkan analysts believe Dr Karadzic could save face by surrendering at the request of his wife, rather than on the order of Nato troops he has eluded for so long.