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03/12/2003
Bosnian Serb sentenced to 27 years over Srebrenica massacre
A former chief of Bosnian Serb army security and intelligence has been sentenced to 27 years jail for his role in the 1995 massacre of Muslim civilians in Srebrenica.
The UN war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia sentenced Momir Nikolic, 48, after he pleaded guilty in May to one count of crimes against humanity (persecutions), following a plea-bargaining deal struck by his lawyers and prosecutors. The tariff, however, was longer than had been agreed during plea bargaining.
In a summary of the judgment of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, released yesterday in The Hague, the judges said that neither sentence suggested by prosecutors or defence lawyers "adequately reflects the totality of the criminal conduct for which Momir Nikolic has been convicted".
Under the deal, the prosecutors agreed to drop other charges and Nikolic agreed to testify in other trials conducted by the Tribunal.
The judges said that in reaching their decision on an appropriate sentence, they considered several mitigating factors, including his expressions of remorse and his willingness to cooperate with prosecutors in other trials. But they noted that his testimony in other trials was "often evasive".
The judges noted that Nikolic attended three meetings at which the fate of Muslim civilians from the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica - which had been previously declared a UN safe area - was decided by Bosnian Serb military leaders.
Their plan was to deport Muslim women and children to other areas, and to separate and then kill Muslim men. It is estimated that more than 7,000 Muslim men and children were murdered following the capture of the Srebrenica enclave, then under protection from UN Dutch forces, in the worst massacre of civilians in Europe since WWII.
The Tribunal found Nikolic recommended possible detention and execution sites, supervised some deportations and separations, and later coordinated the exhumation and reburial of Muslim bodies, thus "ensuring key evidence was destroyed".
Many families still do not know the whereabouts of their murdered relatives.
(gmcg)
The UN war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia sentenced Momir Nikolic, 48, after he pleaded guilty in May to one count of crimes against humanity (persecutions), following a plea-bargaining deal struck by his lawyers and prosecutors. The tariff, however, was longer than had been agreed during plea bargaining.
In a summary of the judgment of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, released yesterday in The Hague, the judges said that neither sentence suggested by prosecutors or defence lawyers "adequately reflects the totality of the criminal conduct for which Momir Nikolic has been convicted".
Under the deal, the prosecutors agreed to drop other charges and Nikolic agreed to testify in other trials conducted by the Tribunal.
The judges said that in reaching their decision on an appropriate sentence, they considered several mitigating factors, including his expressions of remorse and his willingness to cooperate with prosecutors in other trials. But they noted that his testimony in other trials was "often evasive".
The judges noted that Nikolic attended three meetings at which the fate of Muslim civilians from the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica - which had been previously declared a UN safe area - was decided by Bosnian Serb military leaders.
Their plan was to deport Muslim women and children to other areas, and to separate and then kill Muslim men. It is estimated that more than 7,000 Muslim men and children were murdered following the capture of the Srebrenica enclave, then under protection from UN Dutch forces, in the worst massacre of civilians in Europe since WWII.
The Tribunal found Nikolic recommended possible detention and execution sites, supervised some deportations and separations, and later coordinated the exhumation and reburial of Muslim bodies, thus "ensuring key evidence was destroyed".
Many families still do not know the whereabouts of their murdered relatives.
(gmcg)
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