The UN's Yugoslav war crimes tribunal convicted Bosnian Serb military chief Gen. Ratko Mladic on Wednesday of genocide and crimes against humanity, and sentenced him to life in prison for atrocities during Bosnia's 1992-1995 war.
Mladic, 75, was found guilty of commanding forces responsible for crimes including the worst atrocities of the war — the deadly three-year siege of the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo, and the 1995 massacre of some 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the eastern enclave of Srebrenica, which was Europe's worst mass killing since World War II.
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At the memorial centre in Potocari, near Srebrenica, a Bosnian woman raises her arms upon hearing Mladic's sentence. (Amel Emric/Associated Press)
His lawyer, Dragan Ivetic, told journalists that Mladic will appeal.
A three-judge panel in The Hague court, formally known as the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, convicted Mladic of 10 of 11 counts in a dramatic climax to a groundbreaking effort to seek justice for the wars in the former Yugoslavia.
Judge Alphons Orie read out the judgment after ordering Mladic out of the courtroom over an angry outburst.
"The crimes committed rank among the most heinous known to humankind," Orie said.
Mothers of Srebrenica's victims clapped when the convictions were read out.
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Nura Mustafic, one of the Mothers of Srebrenica and other Bosnian organizations, wipes away tears as she reacts to the verdict. (Phil Nijhuis/Associated Press)
Mladic's son, Darko Mladic, said: "I'm not surprised. The court was totally biased from the start."​
Bosnians and Serbs watched from near and far as the long-awaited climax approached. Wednesday's judgment marks the end of the final trial at the tribunal, which was set up in 1993, while fierce fighting was still raging in Bosnia.
Emotions ran high outside the courtroom, with a small skirmish reflecting lingering tensions between Serbs and Bosnians over the trial and the war.
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Mladic gives a thumbs-up as he appears for the pronouncement of the Trial Judgement for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on Wednesday. (Michel Porro/Getty Images)
Despite ailing health, Mladic initially looked relaxed, greeting lawyers and giving a thumbs-up to photographers in court. He nodded regularly as presiding Judge Alphons Orie read out descriptions of atrocities by Bosnian Serb forces, one by one.
Then Mladic's lawyer asked for a delay because the general was suffering high blood pressure. The judge refused, and Mladic burst out with criticism and was ordered to leave the room.
Prosecutors had sought a life sentence, while Mladic's defence lawyers said he should be acquitted on all counts.
Orie said the court confirmed that "genocide, persecution, extermination, murder and the inhuman act of forcible transfer were committed in or around Srebrenica" in 1995. Previous judgments have said it was genocide. However, Orie said the court is "not convinced" of genocidal intent in six other municipalities, in line with previous judgments.

'The epitome of evil'

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein has hailed the conviction of Mladic as a "momentous victory for justice."
In a statement, he said Mladic is "the epitome of evil, and the prosecution of Mladic is the epitome of what international justice is all about."
"Mladic presided over some of the darkest crimes to occur in Europe since World War II, bringing terror, death and destruction to thousands of victims, and sorrow, tragedy and trauma to countless more," he said.
"Today's verdict is a warning to the perpetrators of such crimes that they will not escape justice, no matter how powerful they may be, nor how long it may take. They will be held accountable," Zeid said.
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After the verdict, Fikret Alic holds holds a copy of Time magazine bearing his image. The Bosnian man became a figurehead for the suffering of Bosnians during the war when he was photographed as an emaciated prisoner behind the wire of a Bosnian Serbian prison camp. (Phil Nijhuis/Associated Press)

100,000 died in the conflict

The conflict in the former Yugoslavia erupted after the breakup of the former multi-ethnic federation in the early 1990s, with the worst crimes taking place in Bosnia. More than 100,000 people died and millions lost their homes before a peace agreement was signed in 1995. Mladic went into hiding for around 10 years before his arrest in Serbia in May 2011.
Mladic's political master during the war, former Bosnian Serb president Radovan Karadzic, was also convicted last year of genocide and sentenced to 40 years. He has appealed the ruling.
The man widely blamed for fomenting wars across the Balkans, former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, died in his UN cell in 2006 before tribunal judges could reach verdicts in his trial.
With files from Reuters and CBC News


And read more about the scumsucking shitbag (and who pays him) right here :

Former U.N. Leader MacKenzie Speaks on Behalf of Serb Forces

By Dele Olojede and Roy Gutman
Newsday
UNITED NATIONS
The former U.N. commander in Bosnia has participated in a speakers tour funded by a Serbian-American advocacy group that seeks to dispel the internationally accepted view that Serb fighters were principally responsible for the mass killings, rape and ethnic cleansing that has destroyed the former Yugoslav republic.
In an interview with Newsday, retired Canadian Maj. Gen. Lewis MacKenzie said he has done nothing unethical or improper in connection with last month's tour. MacKenzie last week acknowledged in a telephone conversation from Ottawa that his tour was funded by the group, SerbNet, but said he does not know how much he was paid. In his public appearances, including congressional testimony last month, MacKenzie never disclosed SerbNet's financial support.
MacKenzie said that he customarily receives up to $10,000 an appearance and that he "wouldn't be surprised" if SerbNet paid that rate through his agent.
Accepting money from an advocacy group violates no laws or official policies of the United Nations, but a top U.N. official, who asked to remain anonymous, said, "We quite frankly are displeased with his lack of judgment." MacKenzie, who served as the top U.N. peacekeeper in Bosnia for six months in 1992, argues that all the parties in the Balkans war are to blame for atrocities.
"Dealing with Bosnia is a little bit like dealing with three serial killers -- one has killed 15, one has killed 10, one has killed five," MacKenzie testified before the House Armed Services Committee last month. "Do we help the one that's only killed five?"
That view puts MacKenzie at odds with reports by the United Nations, the United States and international human rights groups that have found the Serbs primarily responsible for the ethnic cleansing and mass killings. Serbian groups support MacKenzie's position, which tends to minimize the role of Serbian fighters.
It was one such group, the Serbian American National Information Network -- or SerbNet -- that sponsored MacKenzie, according to the group's newsletter and treasurer Milan Visnick. The Chicago-based group was formed by several professional, business and religious organizations representing ethnic Serbs in the United States to "articulate the Serbian position" because "Serbs have suffered mightily at the hands of the world media in the last year," according to the founders.
"We were very pleased that there was someone to speak more favorably of the Serbs," said Visnick, who refused to discuss the financial details of the trip, but confirmed that SerbNet was a sponsor. In a recent internal bulletin, SerbNet said the MacKenzie tour -- and other efforts by Serbia's American sympathizers -- have led to the organization's "most successful month yet in bringing the Serbian-American perspective before the wider public."
During his trip, MacKenzie, 53, gave more than a dozen speeches and interviews questioning the value of U.S. military intervention to rescue Bosnia's Muslims. He repeated his oft-stated assertion, for example, that "the vast majority" of cease-fire violations that he observed in Bosnia were committed by Muslims.
"My position is always of objectivity because I don't blame only the Serbs," he told Newsday. "I'll continue to say things exactly the way I see them."