NETHERLANDS: Bosnian Serb policeman Dragan Zelenovic pleads guilty to seven counts of sexual assault during the 1992-95 Bosnian war.

Bosnian Serb policeman Dragan Zelenovic pleads guilty to seven counts of sexual assault during the 1992-95 Bosnian war, in return for a guilty plea, prosecution withdraws the remaining counts in the indictment. One of eight suspects accused for rape and torture as crimes against humanity in the town of Foca in 1992, Dragan Zelenovic, has changed his plea to guilty on seven counts of the indictment, as a consequence of a plea agreement his lawyer Zoran Jovanovic has settled with prosecution. In return for a guilty plea, prosecution withdraws the remaining counts in the indictment and, more important for the accused, the case remains under jurisdiction of the Tribunal and it's not being referred to the Bosnian court. Zelenovic, a 45-year-old former policeman and paramilitary leader, was indicted in 1996 for atrocities committed against non-Serbs in his native Foca region, southeast of Sarajevo during the 1992-95 Bosnian war. After Serb forces took control of Foca, whose population at the time was 52 percent Muslim and 45 percent Serb, they unlawfully detained thousands of Muslims and Croats. The women were separated from the men and as one of the most gruesome means of ethnic cleansing, tens of thousands Muslim girls and women were systematically raped in Bosnia during the war to bare Serbian children. Prosecutors told the court they wanted a sentence in the range of 10-15 years for Zelenovic, while his defence counsel said they recommended a sentence of between 7-10 years. Zelenovic arrived in the Netherlands to face trial in June 2006 after he was arrested in western Siberia in August 2005, where Russian media said he had been working on construction sites under an assumed name. The Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia has jurisdiction over individuals responsible for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

ITN Source | January 17, 2007

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