Amsterdam, June 30, (dpa/GNA) – The United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague is due to hand down a verdict on two former heads of the Serbian state security service on Wednesday, more than 25 years after the end of the Bosnian War.
Jovica Stanisic, 70, and Franko Simatovic, 71, were convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and both face life in prison.
The two defendants were close confidants of former Yugoslavian president Slobodan Milosevic, who involved Serbia in wars in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo during his heavy-handed 12-year rule.
Milosevic was also tried by the tribunal, but died before the verdict was handed down in 2006.
The prosecution holds the two men responsible for the campaign of ethnic cleansing targeting Muslims and Croats.
The murder, expulsion, and destruction were part of a bid to create an “ethnically pure Greater Serbia.”
The two defendants were acquitted in 2013, in a highly controversial verdict that was overturned on appeal. A new was trial ordered.
Stanisic and Simatovic both maintain they are innocent.
GNA