46-year sentence for genocide 'too lenient'

Prosecutors at a UN war crimes appeals court today argued that a Bosnian Serb general’s 46 year prison sentence for genocide is too lenient and should be replaced with life.

Radislav Krstic, 55, the only man convicted of the ”crime of crimes” during the Balkan wars, also appealed both his conviction and the sentence handed down by the UN tribunal in August 2001.

His defence lawyers claim it was never shown beyond doubt that Krstic knew of the massacres of thousands of Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica in 1995 carried out by his troops.

The defence also sought the declaration of a mistrial, arguing that prosecutors failed to give advance disclosure of evidence that would have been in Krstic’s favour.

Prosecutor Mathias Marcussen said the 46 year sentence did not reflect the gravity of the crime, and should be increased to life, the tribunal’s maximum sentence.

“When an accused is convicted and found guilty of 8,000 murders and the forcible transfer of 20,000-25,000,” only a life sentence is appropriate, Marcussen said at the hearing in The Hague.

Krstic should have foreseen that “people would be killed, raped, and beaten.”

Genocide “is recognised internationally as the crime of crimes,” the prosecutor told the bench of five judges in the Dutch capital. ”Without him, these crimes would not have been committed.”

In their verdict, trial judges ruled that Krstic had ”agreed to evil” as commander of the Drina Corps and had overseen the infamous massacre at Srebrenica that left more than 7,000 Muslim men and boys dead.

It was the worst slaughter of civilians in Europe since the Second World War .