Bosnian Serbs criticised for awarding war criminals

SARAJEVO: The Council of Europe on Tuesday criticised authorities of Bosnian Serb-run entity Republika Srpska(RS) over a decision to honour three convicted war criminals, including wartime political leader Radovan Karadzic.

"The decision... represents a serious blow to reconciliation efforts in Bosnia and Herzegovina and is an insult to the numerous victims of those crimes who remain traumatised by the violent past," the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Nils Muiznieks said in a statement.

"While thousands of victims in the region remain without access to justice and reparation, the focus of the authorities in the whole region should be on ensuring that these victims´ human rights are upheld and on fostering harmonious inter-ethnic relations," Muiznieks said.

At a ceremony on Monday marking the 25th anniversary of the parliament of Republika Srpska, a number of people were awarded appreciation certificates, including Karadzic, his successor as RS president Biljana Plavsic and former parliamentary speaker Momcilo Krajisnik. All three have been sentenced by the Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for their role during the 1992-1995 inter-ethnic war in Bosnia that claimed 100,000 lives and displaced more than two million people.

Wartime political chief of Bosnian Serbs, Karadzic was sentenced in March to 40 years imprisonment for genocide and crimes against humanity.

Biljana Plavsic, the only woman convicted by the ICTY, was sentenced to 11 years in jail in 2003 after she pleaded guilty to crimes against humanity for a leading role in a campaign of persecution against Croats and Muslims during Bosnia´s war.

Momcilo Krajisnik, wartime speaker of RS parliament, was convicted of persecuting and forcibly expelling non-Serbs and crimes against humanity. Having served two-thirds of his 20-year jail term, he returned to Bosnia in 2013 to a hero´s welcome by fellow Bosnian Serbs.

The international envoy to Bosnia, Valentin Inzko, condemned the move to honour the trio, saying that by "glorifying the war criminals" the Bosnian Serb authorities "have placed themselves outside of the realm of European and civilised values."

The internationally-brokered Dayton agreement that ended the war in Bosnia divided the Balkans country along ethnic lines into two semi-independent entities: Republika Srpska and the Muslim-Croat Federation.

Bosnian Serbs, led by independence-seeking hardline nationalists, have been defying international efforts to hold accountable those responsible for war crimes committed during the war, accusing the ICTY and the international community of being biased against Serbs.