Yugoslav General cleared of war crimes charges: Voice of Russia

In September 2011, he was sentenced to 27 years in jail.

Russian observers welcome his acquittal as a rare instance of Hague fairness towards a Serb. At the same time, they call attention to the fact that during his time as a Serbian politician he toed the pro-Western line, playing a role in the?ouster of?Slobodan Milosevic and serving as a deputy Prime Minister under Zoran Djindjic.

They say they do not expect the Hague tribunal to show similar leniency towards former Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic or former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic.

Voice of Russia

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27 years in prison for Momcilo

Alexei Chernichenko

The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia sentenced the ex-chief of the General Staff of the Yugoslavian army Momcilo Perisic to 27 years of imprisonment.

The court found the general guilty of military crimes and crimes against humanity in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1993-95.

67-year-old Perisic who was the chief of the General Staff of the Yugoslavian army in 1993-1998 was found guilty of murder and instigation to murder, inhuman acts, persecution and assault of civilians in Sarajevo and Srebrenica. He is blamed for his subordinates? crimes during the siege of Sarajevo in 1993-95, bloody reprisals in Srebrenica and missile shooting at Zagreb in 1995. The judges came to the conclusion that he knew about the planned attack against the Muslim enclave of Srebrenica in Bosnia and Herzegovina but did not take any steps to prevent it or punish those responsible for it.

Pavel Kandel, head of the Department of Ethnic Conflicts of the Institute of Europe at the Russian Academy of Sciences, says the following on the subject:

?Are these accusations fair? He is politically responsible for crimes committed by his subordinates in the name of the Yugoslavian army. However, he is hardly likely to have given direct orders to commit those crimes. Apparently, the Hague Tribunal proceeds from the same notion as in the Milosevic case, namely, the principle of high-ranking state and military officials? responsibility for what was called organized or collective crime.?

Serbian MP and member of the Serbian Radical Party Deyan Mirovic is even less inclined to trust the Hague Tribunal?s decision:

?Unfortunately, I expected this sentence because this is not a real trial but a political one first of all. Perisic defended his country, he was the chief of staff of the Yugoslavian people?s army during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. All he did was within the Constitution, he did not do anything which could be described as a crime.?

Russian expert Pavel Kandel fully agrees with his Serbian colleague:

?The Hague Tribunal is not an institution of justice any more but a political instrument of the western policy towards the Balkan countries. Suffice it to say that the majority of guilty verdicts are passed on Serbs and a little less on Croatians. There are very few guilty verdicts on Bosnians and practically none at all on Kosovo Albanians?.

Source: http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_03_01/Yugoslav-General-cleared-of-war-crimes-charges/

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