RULING TOMORROW ON KARADZIC’S APPEAL

Decision will be one of last remaining cases after former Yugoslavia break-up

THE United Nations judges will rule tomorrow on former Bosnian Serb strongman Radovan Karadzic’s appeal against his conviction for genocide and other atrocities during the bloody civil war in the 1990s.

Karadzic was sentenced in 2016 to 40 years in jail for his role in the bloodshed in Bosnia, including the mid-1995 Srebrenica massacre.

It was Europe’s worst atrocity since World War II.

The Hague court ruling on the fate of the 73-year-old will be one of the last remaining cases springing from the catastrophic break-up of the former Yugoslavia after the fall of communism.

More than 100,000 people died and 2.2 million were left homeless as the 1992-1995 conflict pitted Muslims, Serbs and Croats against each other.

A poet and psychiatrist-turned ruthless political leader, Karadzic was found guilty on 10 counts, including genocide at Srebrenica, where almost 8,000 Muslim men and boys were murdered.

Karadzic was also convicted of orchestrating the nearly fouryear siege of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo in which some 10,000 people died during a campaign of sniping and shelling.

Srebrenica survivors called for Karadzic to be locked up for the rest of his days.

“Like all other survivors of the Srebrenica genocide, I expect Radovan Karadzic to be sentenced to life imprisonment,” said Amir Kulaglic, 59, during a recent rally in Bosnia.

Karadzic, who still cuts a distinctive figure in court with his trademark white mane of hair, has denounced his conviction as the result of a “political trial” and appealed on 50 grounds.

At his appeal hearing, he said he “never had anything against Muslims, we considered them Serbs with a Muslim religion” adding: “Serbs, Croats, Muslims, we are one people, we have one identity.”

His lawyer at the appeal said UN judges “presumed him guilty and then constructed a judgment to justify its presumption”.

Karadzic was convicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, but that is now defunct, so the appeals hearing is being conducted by the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals.

Karadzic’s military alter-ego, former Bosnian Serb army commander Ratko Mladic, dubbed the “Butcher of Bosnia”, is also currently appealing a life sentence on similar charges.