Radovan Karadzic will face two genocide charges before the UN's Yugoslav war crimes tribunal instead of one. The former Bosnian Serb leader is expected to enter a new plea on Friday.
Judges at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) said on Monday that they for the most part approved a prosecution motion aimed at streamlining the original indictment. Consequently, Karadzic is now charged with crimes committed in 27 municipalities instead of 41. This is expected to speed up the trial.
However, the most important change is that prosecutors dropped one charge of complicity in genocide while splitting the actual genocide charge into two separate counts that cover two different time periods.
The first count covers ethnic cleansing campaigns throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina during 1992. The second refers to the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of some 8000 Muslim men.
The prosecutors also wanted to add three more murder counts to the indictment, but the judges did not grant that amendment saying it was "not adequately supported by evidence."
Further charges against Karadzic include crimes against humanity, murder, deportation, terror and unlawful attacks on civilians, as well as taking hostages.
Karadzic, who represents himself, is expected to react to the changes on Friday. He repeatedly refused to enter a plea in response to the original indictment, saying he wanted to wait for the amendments first. Because of his refusal, the court entered an automatic not-guilty plea on his behalf.
The Hague Justice Portal has more
Tags: genocide, icty, indictment, new, radovan karadzic, trial, war crimes
