The Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) war crimes court indicted the former Serb commander of a special police brigade March 13 for his alleged role in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre during the Bosnian civil war. The BiH prosecutor accuses Nedjo Ikonic of participating in the killing of thousands of Muslim men and boys including more than one thousand who escaped Srebinaca but were detained in a warehouse in the nearby village of Kravice. Ikonic was extradited to BiH in January after he was arrested on an international arrest warrant. Three other former Bosnian Serb policemen have been indicted on charges of genocide for their alleged roles massacre.
The BiH war crimes court was set up in 2005 to relieve the caseload of the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and is authorized to try lower-level war crime suspects. The court delivered its first sentences against war crimes suspects from Yugoslavia’s violent ethnic conflicts of the 1990s in July 2008, convicting seven of genocide for their involvement in killings committed at Srebrenica. The ICTY retains jurisdiction over high-level war crimes allegations, such as those against Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic and General Ratko Mladic.
From Jurist, March 13. Used with permission.
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