Arrested last year in Serbia under a false identity after 13 years as a fugitive, Karadzic has been indicted on two counts of genocide, the gravest charges possible, for allegedly overseeing the mass murder and deportation of tens of thousands of Bosnia’s Muslims in the north-west of the country in 1992 and at Srebrenica in the north-east in 1995.

He faces a further nine charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity for the 44-month Serbian siege of the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo, in 1992-95, and for taking more than 200 UN peacekeepers hostage in 1995 as an insurance policy against NATO bombing raids.

Karadzic using Milosevic and Seselj tactics

Fifteen years into the operations of the tribunal, the Karadzic trial is shaping up to be its most important and one of its last. But it looks likely to get off to a frustrating and demoralizing start with the accused boycotting the proceedings in The Hague.

“Karadzic is repeating the practice of Milosevic and Seselj. He is trying to humiliate ICTY and make it less efficient, to slow it down in any possible way. He keeps in mind the fact that ICTY is closing as of next year, and he is using that fact and boycots the proceedings, forcing the ICTY in that case, to fasten its work and thus, make its efficiency relative”, says Srdjan Dizdarevic, the president of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Karadzic described his long-awaited trial as “the biggest, most complex, important, and sensitive case ever before this tribunal” and argued he needed a lot more time to plough through around one million pages of prosecution evidence, which Mr. Dizdarevic calls absurd.

“He had enough time to prepare, and the Court did treat him correctly and fair all along. Karadzic took time to consult and engage a great number of lawyers and advocates, thus he cannot address to Court saying the Court has jeopardized his right to fair trial when it gave him sufficient time to prepare”, says Dizdarevic.

ICTY in dilemma

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) has promised that Karadzic’s trial will be fair, but also quick. Karadzic faces just 11 charges, compared to the 66 filed against Milosevic. And in the final indictment filed a week ago, prosecutors also reduced the number of incidents they would present evidence about, largely in order to keep the trial to a manageable length. Even so, they expect it to take a year to present their case against Karadzic. 

But with Karadzic’s boycott, the trial judges are faced with a difficult dilemma. Tribunal officials seem determined to go ahead, but doing so is likely to feed Bosnian Serb resentment against the international body. They can appoint Karadzic with a court-appointed lawyer — which he has said he will refuse — or simply continue without him, piping the proceedings into Karadzic’s cell.

Karadzic trial important for B&H

According to the words of Srdjan Dizdarevic, the trial of Radovan Karadzic is of great importance for Bosnia and Herzegovina, since it will determine happenings and facts that are in clear relation to Karadzic, and it will bring up material proves on war crimes and war happenings in the period of 1992-95. That is of great significance for people in B&H, to see Karadzic convicted for his misdeeds, and to give at least some satisfaction and sense of achieved justice to the victims of war.

“Karadzic trial would also be a warning and example to those potential future adventurists who could come to the idea to have the history repeated, and have their ideologies realized through war happenings, ethnic cleansings etc. Thus, we hope that Karadzic will fail in its attempts to mine this process and wound ICTY”, concludes Mr. Dizdarevic.

Karadzic was the political leader of the Bosnian Serbs during the 1992-95 war which left 100,000 dead, mainly Bosnian Muslims, and bequeathed a country partitioned between a Serbian half and a Muslim-Croat half. The fundamental charge is that Karadzic orchestrated a systematic campaign of murder and terror to rid half of Bosnia of all non-Serbs.

The “objective was the permanent removal of Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats from Bosnian Serb-claimed territory through crimes charged in this indictment,” the prosecution alleges, “by means which included … genocide, persecution, extermination, murder, deportation, and inhumane acts.”

Related articles:

Reuters Video – Bosnian women travel to The Hague for Karadzic trial;

Radovan Karadzic – Wikipedia.