UN judges deliver genocide verdict on Srebrenica

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

UN judges deliver genocide verdict on Srebrenica
The Associated Press
Thursday, June 10, 2010; 4:45 AM

THE HAGUE, Netherlands -- U.N. judges are delivering their verdict against seven Bosnian Serb military and police officers for genocide and other war crimes in the U.N.-declared safe zone of Srebrenica in 1995.

It is the largest trial the Yugoslav war crimes trial has ever conducted and involved nearly 450 witnesses and three years of hearings that ended last year.

Five of the defendants are accused of genocide related to what the indictment calls the "summary execution of more than 7,000 Bosnian men and boys," the worst massacre in Europe since World War II. Two face lesser charges.

The seven defendants subject to Thursday's verdict are linked to Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, whose own trial is in its early stages.




Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/10/AR2010061000782.html

[Judi Lynn]

1. A sad reminder of another 1990's genocide:

The Rwandan Genocide was the 1994 mass killing of an estimated 800,000 people. Over the course of approximately 100 days from the assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana on April 6 through mid-July, at least 800,000 people were killed, according to a Human Rights Watch estimate.<1> Other estimates of the death toll have ranged between 500,000 and 1,000,000 <2> (a commonly quoted figure is 800,000) or as much as 20% of the country's total population.

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_Genocide

[rpannier]

2. Thanks for posting

Both this and Rwanda

[Soylent Brice]

3. K&R

[xchrom]

4. recommend

[Solly Mack]

5. k/r

[Judi Lynn]

6. Life for Bosnian Serbs over genocide at Srebrenica

Page last updated at 12:30 GMT, Thursday, 10 June 2010 13:30 UK
Life for Bosnian Serbs over genocide at Srebrenica

A UN tribunal has convicted two Bosnian Serbs for committing genocide in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre and sentenced them to life in prison. Vujadin Popovic, 53, and Ljubisa Beara, 70, were among seven former high-ranking military and police officials to be sentenced.

The court jailed five other defendants for between five and 35 years.

The case is the largest yet at the tribunal, set up to deal with war crimes in the Balkans during the 1990s.

Up to 8,000 Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims) were killed in one week in July 1995 around the town of Srebrenica, where a UN safe haven had been declared two years earlier. It was the worst massacre of the Bosnian war.

If the judgements against Popovic and Beara are upheld, they will be the first suspects to be definitively convicted for genocide by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

'Personal view'

Both men, chiefs of security in parts of the Bosnian Serb army, were found guilty of genocide, extermination, murder and persecution.

Another chief of security, Drago Nikolic, was found guilty of aiding and abetting genocide, and sentenced to a prison term of 35 years. The court said Popovic's "robust participation" in the plan for the massacre "demonstrates that he not only knew of this intent to destroy, he also shared it".

It described Beara as the "driving force behind the murder enterprise". "Beara had a very personal view of the staggering number of victims destined for execution," the ruling said.

Both Popovic and Beara were acting under orders from Gen Ratko Mladic, who is still at large.

More:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/10283403.stm

[Posteritatis]

7. Excellent! (nt)