The former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadžić has been found guilty of genocide over the 1995 massacre in Srebrenica and sentenced to 40 years in jail.

The key verdict from a United Nations tribunal in The Hague was delivered 18 months after a five-year trial of Karadžić, accused of being one of the chief architects of atrocities during the 1992-95 Balkans war.

The 70-year-old, who insisted his actions were aimed at protecting Serbs during the Bosnian conflict, was found guilty of 10 out of the 11 charges he faced at the international criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

Prosecutors said that Karadžić, as political leader and commander-in-chief of Serb forces in Bosnia, was responsible for some the worst acts of brutality during the war, including the 44-month deadly siege of Sarajevo and the 1995 massacre of more than 8,000 Bosnian men and boys in the Srebrenica enclave.

Speaking after the verdicts, Serge Brammertz, the tribunal’s chief prosecutor, said: “Moments like this should also remind us that in innumerable conflicts around the world today, millions of victims are now waiting for their own justice. This judgement shows that it is possible to deliver it.”

The presiding ICTY judge delivering the ruling, O-Gon Kwon, cleared Karadžić of one charge: responsibility for genocide in attacks on other towns and villages where Croats and Bosnians were driven out.

On Srebrenica, Kwon said: “On the basis of the totality of the evidence, the [ICTY] finds that the accused shared the expanded common purpose of killing the Bosnian Muslim males of Srebrenica and that he significantly contributed to it.”

Karadžić was the only person with the power to intervene and protect those being killed, Kwon said. “Far from that,” he said, “the accused ordered Bosnian male detainees to be transferred elsewhere to be killed. With full knowledge of the ongoing killing, Karadžić declared a state of war in Srebrenica.”

He smiled and nodded to one or two familiar faces from the Serb press in the gallery, but hardly glanced at the public gallery, which was packed with survivors and victims’ family members, mostly women grieving lost sons and husbands. They obeyed the tribunal instructions to stay quiet throughout the proceedings, though there was a quiet grunt of disappointment when Karadžić was acquitted of one of the genocide charges.

The only time Karadžić appeared nervous was when he stood to receive sentence, his arms stiff by his side. His lawyer said he would appeal.

Outside the tribunal, there was anger that Karadžić did not receive a life sentence. “Is the tribunal not ashamed? Do the Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats not have a right to justice? He got 40 years. That’s not enough,” said Kada Hotic, one of the bereaved mothers from Srebrenica.

The verdicts are the most significant moment in the 23-year existence of the ICTY, and among the last it will deliver. Set up in 1993, the court has so far indicted 161 suspects. Of those, 80 were convicted and sentenced, 18 acquitted, 13 sent back to local courts and 36 had the indictments withdrawn or died.

The former psychiatrist and charismatic politician, still with his characteristic bouffant hairstyle, is the most senior Balkans leader to face judgment at the ICTY. The former Serbian president Slobodan Milošević died in his cell in The Hague in 2006 before judges could deliver their verdicts on his trial.

Apart from Karadžić, three suspects remain on trial, including his military chief, Ratko Mladić and Serb ultranationalist Vojislav Šešelj. Eight cases are being appealed and two defendants are to face retrials. The judgment in Šešelj’s case is scheduled for next Thursday.

Karadžić was indicted along with Mladić in 1995 but evaded arrest until he was captured in Belgrade, Serbia, in 2008. At the time he was posing as New Age healer Dr Dragan Dabic, and was disguised by a thick beard and shaggy hair.

More than 20 years after the guns fell silent in Bosnia, Karadžić is still considered a hero in Serb-controlled parts of the country, and the verdict is unlikely to help reconcile the enduring deep divisions in Bosnia and the region.

Won't serve the full 40 years. You heard it here first.

He'll die in prison either way, but why they didn't just give him a life sentence is mystifying

Sadly no one on here gives a fuck. If the bosnianiaks were say not muslim people would be caring

Sadly no one on here gives a fuck. If the bosnianiaks were say not muslim people would be caring

This is a terribly disappointing comment from you.

A work colleague lived through the war near Sarajevo. His father was put into a camp and for years afterwards had trouble sleeping and going to the toilet due to the torture he was subjected to. My colleague was lucky to get to Australia, on his way out of the country, he was almost stopped by a Croatian border guard. The stories he told me about the war are terrible. 40 years isn't enough. This fucker should be given a piece of bread and a glass of water per day and that's it.

How so? Dickheads like socawho and 433 made sure the other thread got shit really quickly but are quiet when this ucktard gets jailed. Or how you said that the Baghdad bombing isnt news worthy because it happens all the time . So people should only care if it only happens to the west??

How so? Dickheads like socawho and 433 made sure the other thread got shit really quickly but are quiet when this ucktard gets jailed. Or how you said that the Baghdad bombing isnt news worthy because it happens all the time . So people should only care if it only happens to the west??

Because you just assume that no one knows about the war, or knows anyone who was affected by the war, or doesn't care about the war. It's disappointing that you immediately dismiss any form of discussion. Especially given your wife's family who i'm sure were directly affected by the war.

Of course the Baghdad article is newsworthy. Don't put words in my mouth. My point regarding the that thread (which is not remotely relatable to this one) is that it is such a regular occurrence in that country/region that we are desensitised to it and thus do not react the same way as we do when the same thing happens in Belgium/France. This is irrelevant to this discussion.

If you want to have a discussion fine, but cut the petty shit out of this thread before it gets a chance to start please.

Out of curiosity, have all of the victims of the Srebrenica massacre been identified? I recall approx. 12 months ago several more bodies were uncovered. Not a nice way to open wounds for the country.

I have not been to Bosnia. What is the reaction to this news in Bosnia?

They are always finding bodies. My wifes mum lost one of her brothers in the war so did my father in law my wifes friends husband lost his father as well. He got sent to sn interment camp and was totured . And as he was a soldier he got it much worse.

you have obvious bias with your wife...so you dont have an ounce of objectivity in this...so fuck off

Edited by Socawho: 26/3/2016 07:31:54 PM

That's horrible.

I don't know whether finding a relatives body would be good or bad at this late stage. Such a long time after the war it would only open old wounds.

Out of curiosity (feel free not to answer if you're not comfortable doing so) but do the mrs's family speak much about those times?

None of them speak on it. Hurts to much. But my mother in law has her brothers medal. My wifes friends husband has his fathers medal as well. He got the equivalent of the vic cross.

How so? Dickheads like socawho and 433 made sure the other thread got shit really quickly but are quiet when this ucktard gets jailed. Or how you said that the Baghdad bombing isnt news worthy because it happens all the time . So people should only care if it only happens to the west??

you have obvious bias with your wife...so you dont have an ounce of objectivity in this...so fuck off

Edited by Socawho: 26/3/2016 07:31:54 PM

Did i say anything about debating this 433? All i said u and socawho made sure the other thread got made into s cesspit of anti muslim hysetria pretty quickly. Alad you dont know any decorum and just want to troll anyone who disagrees with you.