UN court acquits Serbian leader of war crimes

BELGRADE, Serbia

Serbian Radical Party leader Vojislav Seselj has been acquitted of a series of charges at a war crimes tribunal at The Hague.

The 61-year-old Serbian nationalist leader and former deputy prime minister had faced three counts of crimes against humanity and six counts of violations of the laws or customs of war.

A former ally of Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic, Seselj, in addition to individual responsibility, was charged with having committed joint crimes namely the forcible removal of Croats, Muslims and other non-Serb population from parts of Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Vojvodina region of Serbia.

This was the first-instance judgment against Seselj four years after the end of his trial.

During the case, more than 89 witnesses testified about crimes such as the murder of Muslims and Croats and the destruction of private property and mosques across Bosnia.

Seselj turned himself in to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in early 2003. He was released in 2014 to receive cancer treatment.

More than a 1,000 supporters greeted Seselj upon his return to Belgrade's Nikola Tesla Airport.

In the following days Seselj was reelected unopposed as chairman of his Serbian Radical Party.

Upon his return, Seselj publicly described Bosnian Serb general Ratko Mladic and political leader Radovan Karadzic, both convicted war criminals, as "heroes and patriots".

The European Parliament passed on a resolution condemning Seselj for "warmongering, incitement to hatred and encouragement of territorial claims and attempting to derail Serbia from its European path”.

Seselj later said he would not return to the ICTY voluntarily, adding that the Serbian authorities would have to return him by force. However, no steps were taken to extradite Seselj.