The first successfully completed trial of Serbs accused of war crimes during the Kosovo conflict ended in The Hague yesterday with 22-year sentences for the three officials most closely involved in the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo, but a shock acquittal for the highest profile defendant, former Serbian president Milan Milutinovic.
Like the other five Serbs on trial, Milutinovic, 66, had been accused of what prosecutor Thomas Hannis said was "a joint criminal enterprise" in the first half of 1999, which resulted in the killing and persecution of thousands of Kosovo Albanians (Kosovars) and the deportation of about 800,000 to neighbouring Albania. "They burned or destroyed villages so there was nothing left to return to," Hannis said.
Milutinovic, who led Serbia from December 1997 to December 2002, was largely a figurehead president. The prosecution argued that Slobodan Milosevic, who was the Yugoslav president at the time, was the "primary planner".
Milutinovic, the man with de jure authority over the military forces which were responsible for much of the carnage and forced deportations in Kosovo, was charged with crimes against humanity including murder, deportation and persecution, and one charge of war crimes.
He pleaded not guilty on the grounds that he had little real power, and the court accepted his claim. Charged in 1999, he surrendered in January 2003, one month after his five-year presidential term finished.
The toughest sentences were handed down to Nikola Sainovic, former vice-prime minister; General Nebojsa Pavkovic, commander of the Serb Army in Kosovo; and police commander General Sreten Lukic, who all received 22-year sentences. The ex-Yugoslav Army chief of staff Dragoljub Ojdanic and former general Vladimir Lazarevic were convicted of deportation and forcible transfer of civilians but acquitted of murder and persecution. They each got 15 years.
Milosevic died of a heart attack in his cell in The Hague in March 2006.
At the trial's opening session Hannis said: "The evidence in this case will show that the six accused ... were co-participants with Slobodan Milosevic and other Serbian political, military and police officials in a joint criminal enterprise."
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Trio jailed for 'ethnic cleansing'
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