Bosnian Brothes Jailed for War Crimes

Bosnia’s War Crimes Chamber on February 4 jailed two Bosnian Serb brothers, Ranko and Rajko Vukovic, to 12 years each for killing two Bosnian Muslim civilians near the town of Foca in May 1992, local media reported. Ranko Vukovic was cleared of an additional charge of rape.

Foca was the scene of numerous war crimes, including systematic rape, enslavement, torture, and murder (see “RFE/RL Newsline,” January 17, February 20, June 14, September 5, and November 2, 2007).

In another, unrelated war crimes trial, a former prime minister of the Bosnian Serb-dominated Republika Srpska, Gojko Klickovic, on January 31 entered a “not guilty” plea. Klickovic was handed over by Serbia in June 2007 to face charges that he “ordered, planned, prepared, aided, and abetted in murder, deportation, forcible transfer, and imprisonment of civilians” in the northern municipality of Bosanska Krupa between 1990 and 1992 (see “RFE/RL Newsline,” June 21, 2007).

Klickovic served as prime minister of the Republika Srpska from May 1996 to January 1998. He also served in the Bosnian Serbs’ wartime administration, under Radovan Karadzic.

Source Radio Free Europe

Copyright (c) 2008. RFE/RL, Inc.

Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty,

1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

Net News Publisher