The former leader of Bosnia’s Muslim army, Rasim Delic, was sentenced on Monday to three years in jail by a UN war crimes tribunal for allowing the torture of Bosnian Serb soldiers by Islamic foreign fighters.
Judge Bakone Justice Moloto, citing the “appalling brutal” mistreatment meted out by Islamic foreign fighters during the 1992-1995 Bosnia war, said that tribunal judges had decided by majority that Delic was guilty of one count of cruel treatment by soldiers under his command.
Delic, 59, one of the most senior Bosnian Muslim leaders to appear at the tribunal, failed to prevent or punish cruel treatment by mujahidin fighters in the village of Livade and Kamenica Camp in central Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1995, the tribunal said.
During one incident at Kamenica Camp, captured Bosnian Serb Army soldiers were forced to kiss the severed head of a fellow soldier.
Prosecutors argued that Delic had known of the foreign fighters’ inclination to violence and had failed to prevent or punish their atrocities, and had asked for a total sentence of 15 years’ imprisonment.
Moloto himself had dissented in the ruling, saying there was not enough evidence that Delic could have exercised sufficient control over the fighters.
By majority decision, the three-judge panel acquitted Delic of three other counts in his indictment, of murder and cruel treatment.
The court said one of the most serious allegations — the summary execution of about 24 captured Bosnian Croats in June 1993 —took place just before Delic was promoted to commander.
The judges also said they took into account the fact that Delic helped negotiate several peace deals, including the Dayton accord that ended the Bosnian war.
Bosnian Serb and Bosnian Croat officials, as well as war victims groups, said the sentence was too lenient and accused the Hague court of political bias.
Delic is one of a handful of Bosnian Muslims to stand trial in The Hague for war crimes committed during the Bosnian war. Most accused are Serbs but the court has indicted senior figures from all three Bosnian ethnic groups.
Bosnian Serb President Rajko Kuzmanovic called it a “flagrant violation of international law and an example of double standards in judiciary.”
“A verdict like this harms confidence in the activities and neutrality of the tribunal,” Kuzmanovic said in a written statement.
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