Ex-bosnian leader sentenced to life
Court upholds conviction for genocide, war crimes
THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Former Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic, one of the chief architects of the slaughter and devastation of Bosnia’s 1992-95 war, was sentenced to life imprisonment Wednesday as United Nations appeals judges upheld his convictions for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Karadzic, 73, barely reacted in court as Presiding Judge Vagn Joensen increased his original 40-year sentence to life.
Survivors of the conflict who packed into the Hague courtroom’s public gallery erupted into applause and then streamed outside weeping and hugging one another.
The prosecutor who worked for a decade to convict Karadzic welcomed the rulings, saying they should prove even to Karadzic’s supporters in Bosnia that he is no hero.
“Karadzic will be remembered by history as a war criminal responsible for horrific human suffering,” said Prosecutor Serge Brammertz.
Karadzic’s lawyer, Peter Robinson, said the disgraced leader accepted “moral responsibility” for the suffering in the war. But he said Karadzic insisted after the hearing that “politics triumphed over justice today. The appeals chamber whitewashed an unjust trial and an unfair verdict.”
In Srebrenica, the eastern Bosnian town that witnessed the war’s bloody climax when Serb forces slaughtered some 8,000 Muslim men and boys in 1995, relatives of victims clutched photos of lost loved ones, cried and applauded as they watched a delayed broadcast of the hearing.
Joensen said Karadzic’s original 40-year sentence, handed down in 2016, “underestimates the extraordinary gravity of Karadzic’s responsibility and his integral participation in the most egregious of crimes.”
Karadzic’s wartime military commander Gen. Ratko Mladic is also awaiting an appeal judgment of his genocide and war crimes conviction, which earned him a life sentence. Both men were convicted of genocide for their roles in the Srebrenica massacre.
Last week, Bosnian war wounds were revived when it was revealed that the suspect in the mosque shootings that left at least 50 people dead in New Zealand appeared to show admiration for Karadzic and his legacy. In a video, the self-proclaimed white supremacist is seen driving apparently on his way to the attack and listening to a wartime Bosnian Serb song praising Karadzic and his fight against Bosnia’s Muslims.