MoreKaradzic defends "holy" Serb cause
Haveeru Daily
Mar 02, 2010 - 12:00
THE HAGUE (AFP) – Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic told his genocide trial Monday that the conflict launched in Bosnia had been a "holy" cause against Muslim aggression.
Ending his boycott of the UN's International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, Kardzic said he would use the trial "to defend the greatness" of his people who had endured centuries of persecution.
"I will defend that nation of ours and their cause that is just and holy," said a confident Karadzic speaking from the defence lawyers' bench at the tribunal in The Hague.
The 64-year-old, who is conducting his own defence, stands charged as the "supreme commander" of an cleansing campaign targeting Croats and Muslims in the 1992-95 war that claimed 100,000 lives and displaced 2.2 million people.
Wearing a dark suit and tie, Karadzic outlined his defence to 11 counts of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in an opening statement that consumed nearly five hours that continues on Tuesday.
He risks life imprisonment but has pleaded not guilty.
"I stand here before you not to defend the mere mortal that I am, but to defend the greatness of a small nation in Bosnia Hercegovina, which for 500 years has had to suffer and has demonstrated a great deal of modesty and perseverance to survive in freedom," Karadzic told the judges.
"The only plan of the Serbs at the time was to protect people, property and territory."
Karadzic is accused of having colluded with the late Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic to plot the creation of a "Greater Serbia" that was to include 60 percent of Bosnian territory. Serbs made up about one-third of Bosnia's population.
Often referring to himself "Dr Karadzic", he told the court there never was an "intention, any idea, let alone plan, to expel Muslims and Croats from the (self-proclaimed Bosnian Serb state) Republika Srpska".
"The Serb Democratic Party and Radovan Karadzic and the Serb people in Bosnia Hercegovina did their utmost, everything that could have done, in order to avoid a war," Karadzic said, adding that "fundamentalist" Muslims wanted all Serbs out of Bosnia to create an Islamic state.
"The Serbs were not engaged in action, they were engaged in reaction."
Karadzic showed the court a photograph of what he claimed was a Bosnian soldier holding the severed head of a Serb fighter.
This illustrated, he said, that the Serbs "were dealing with the raging bull, but the office of the prosecutor claims they were dealing with lambs and causing lambs irreparable harm."
Among the charges against Karadzic are the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of more than 7,000 Muslim men and boys, and the 44-month siege of Sarajevo that ended in November 1995 with some 10,000 people killed.
He responded that Serbs had acted legitimately to "provocations" from the Muslim-held enclaves of Srebrenica and Zepa.
Hatidza Mehmedovic, whose husband and two sons died at Srebrenica, said she "cannot believe" Karadzic's testimony.
"What he is telling here today is really not true, because I experienced Srebrenica and the war in Bosnia and this is not what my experience is," she told journalists outside the court.
"For us victims, the most important thing is that this monster faces justice."
Arrested on a Belgrade bus in July 2008 after 13 years on the run, Karadzic refused to attend the opening of his trial last October, insisting on more time to prepare his case.
The court ruled last Friday that the first prosecution witness will take the stand on Wednesday, directly after Karadzic's opening statement.
He filed a motion Monday to appeal that decision, seeking a new trial delay until June 17, having threatened through his legal adviser to resume his boycott if it failed.
The court has appointed a British lawyer to take over the defence if Karadzic opted to be absent.
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