Karadzic Sentence Increased To Life By UN Court
UN Court Rejects Karadzic’s Appeal Against Genocide, War Crimes Convictions
RFE
An international appeals court at The Hague has rejected former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic’s appeals against his convictions of genocide and war crimes in Bosnia-Herzegovina during the 1990s, and has extended his 40-year sentence to life in prison.
However, the court rejected an appeal by prosecutors to overturn Karadzic’s earlier acquittal on a second genocide charge related to the killings of Bosnian Muslims and Croats in 1992 in the territory of Republika Srpska.
The ruling is the final judgment on Karadzic’s role in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, his orchestration of a nearly four-year siege of Sarajevo, and war crimes committed in 20 Bosnian municipalities for which Karadzic was convicted in 2016.
The 73-year-old Karadzic was convicted of genocide in 2016 and initially sentenced to 40 years in prison for the July 1995 Srebrenica massacre of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys by Bosnian Serb forces.
He was also found guilty of leading a campaign of ethnic cleansing that forced Croats and Muslims out of Serb-claimed areas of Bosnia during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war — including the siege of Sarajevo that resulted in the deaths of more than 10,000 people, about half of whom were civilians.
The March 20 ruling on Karadzic’s appeals was issued by the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT), a United Nations court that is dealing with cases left over from the now-defunct trial court, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).
Reading out the appeals court’s decision, Judge Vagn Joensen said Karadzic’s sentence was increased to life imprisonment because “the 40-year sentence inadequately reflect[ed] the extraordinary gravity of Karadzic’s crime as well as his central and instrumental participation in four joint criminal enterprises.”
Joensen said Karadzic failed to refute the ICTY’s conclusions about his intent to commit genocide.
The court ruled that the ICTY was correct to conclude that Karadzic participated in the Srebrenica massacre because he was in constant contact with people on the ground.
It said Karadzic also failed to prove that the trial court was mistaken when it concluded he was guilty of taking part in a joint criminal enterprise to terrorize the population of Sarajevo.
Regarding war crimes in 20 Bosnian towns and cities for which Karadzic was convicted, Joensen said Karadzic also failed to prove the trial court reached the wrong conclusions in its verdict.
Joensen said Karadzic simply listed “his own disagreements with the trial chamber” in his appeal.
Murat Tahirovic, the president of the Association of Victims and Witnesses of Genocide, told RFE/RL’s correspondent at The Hague court that members of his organization were pleased with the court’s ruling but also disappointed the prosecutors’ appeal for a conviction on a second charge of genocide was rejected.
“He got a life sentence, life in prison
Tahirovic said. “Unfortunately, a genocide conviction for crimes in other municipalities has not been adjudicated. But in a nutshell, we got what we feel he must be judged for. And he received that verdict. Those are the facts that will remain.”
Zeljko Komsic, the Croatian member of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency, told RFE/RL in Sarajevo that Karadzic’s final verdict “presents partial satisfaction” to the relatives of genocide victims.
“Unfortunately, this verdict won’t replace the pain and the trauma they survive,” Komsic said. “Today, before everything, we have to keep in our minds the survivors and the families of genocide victims.”
Nemin Niksic, leader of Bosnia’s Social Democratic Party, welcomed the court’s ruling as “a major event for Bosnia and all its citizens, especially for the families of victims of aggression, genocide and other war crimes committed in Bosnia.”
In Zagreb, Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic told the daily newspaper Vecernji List that “the verdict cannot give back the lives of tens of thousands of victims and alleviate the pain of their families and survivors. But it must serve as a permanent warning.”