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A UN judge will rule on the appeal of the Bosnian Serb military chief against his genocide in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.
The appellate judge is preparing to pass a verdict on the former Bosnian Serb military leader Ratko Mladic (Ratko Mladic), ending the last Bosnian genocide trial before the UN Court of the Former Yugoslavia.
The 78-year-old Mladic led the Bosnian Serb forces during the 1992-95 Bosnian War.
Known as the “Bosnian Butcher”, he was convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in 2017, including intimidating civilians in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo and killing more than 8,000 Muslim men during the 43-month siege in 1995 Boys in Srebrenica, Bosnia
This is the most serious massacre on European soil since World War II, and it is also the only genocide on the European continent recognized by two international courts.
The widow and mother of the victim will appear in court to hear the verdict of a panel of five judges led by the Chief Justice of Zambia, Prisca Matimba Nyambe.
The judges will begin to announce their verdict at 3 pm local time (13:00 GMT).
The verdict came after 25 years of trial by the United Nations Ad Hoc Tribunal for War Crimes in the Former Yugoslavia, which convicted 90 people.
It is widely regarded as one of the predecessors of the International Criminal Court, which is the world’s first permanent war crimes court and is also located in The Hague.
United Nations Prosecutor Serge Brammertz emphasized the importance of Mladic’s ruling for victims who endured the trauma of the conflicts of the 1990s every day.
“If you talk to the survivors, the mothers (of Srebrenica) who lost their husbands and sons: their lives really stopped on the day of the genocide,” he told reporters before the verdict.
Mladic was first indicted in July 1995.
After the Bosnian War, he went into hiding and was eventually arrested in 2011 and handed over to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia by the pro-Western government in power at the time.
In Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, residents lamented that Mladic is still regarded as a hero in this ethnically divided Serb-ruled area.
“Twenty-five years later, I feel that the war does not seem to be over,” said Mela Softic, a 37-year-old marketing expert who spent her childhood in the besieged Sarajevo.
Serb veteran Milje Radovich from the town of Foca in eastern Bosnia told the Associated Press: “I can’t accept any verdict… for me, he is an idol. For the Serbs, He is an idol.”
Mladic’s lawyer appealed his conviction and argued that the former general could not be held accountable for possible crimes committed by his subordinates. They demanded acquittal or retrial.
The prosecutor hopes to maintain Mladic’s conviction and his life sentence.
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