Serb wartime leader held after 11 years on run
Wednesday, 23 July 2008
BELGRADE, July 22 (Reuters): Bosnian Serb wartime president Radovan Karadzic, indicted for genocide in the Bosnia war, was captured in disguise near Belgrade after 11 years on the run and had been working as a doctor, Serbian officials said on Tuesday.
The arrest on Monday of Karadzic, who is held responsible for the siege of Sarajevo and the massacre of 8,000 Muslims in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995, was a condition for Serbian progress towards European Union membership.
He is the most prominent Balkan war crimes suspect arrested since late Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic was sent to the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague on genocide charges in 2001, leaving only two suspects at large.
The Serbian officials said Karadzic was caught while moving from one Belgrade suburb to another. They showed reporters a photograph of an unrecognizable Karadzic, now 63, looking thin, with a long, white beard, flowing hair and thick glasses.
The arrest on Monday of Karadzic, who is held responsible for the siege of Sarajevo and the massacre of 8,000 Muslims in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995, was a condition for Serbian progress towards European Union membership.
He is the most prominent Balkan war crimes suspect arrested since late Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic was sent to the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague on genocide charges in 2001, leaving only two suspects at large.
The Serbian officials said Karadzic was caught while moving from one Belgrade suburb to another. They showed reporters a photograph of an unrecognizable Karadzic, now 63, looking thin, with a long, white beard, flowing hair and thick glasses.