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UN War Crimes Tribunal Chief Urges Croatia to Extradite War Crime Suspects
UN chief war crimes prosecutor Carla Del Ponte Friday urged the Croatian government to hand over two suspects of war crimes to the International Criminal Tribunal based in The Hague, the Netherlands.
Del Ponte, speaking to the press after meeting with Croatian Prime Minister Ivica Racan, said the indictments and arrest warrants had been passed to the Croatian authorities a month ago but Racan sent her a letter containing some objections which she rejected.
"The most important reason for my visit today is to explain why I had to reject his objections," said Del Ponte.
The Croatian government has good cooperative relations with the tribunal, but the most important thing now is for it to extradite the suspects, said the prosecutor.
Neither Del Ponte nor Ivica Racan gave the names of the two suspected criminals. Croatian media speculated they might be two retired generals who allegedly committed crimes against the Serbs during the 1991-1995 conflict with Croatia.
After former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was extradited to The Hague last month, the U.N. criminal tribunal sped up the process of handing over other suspects in former Yugoslavia.
Bosnian Serb Prime Minister Mladen Ivanic said Wednesday while visiting The Hague that the Serb government will make a decree allowing cooperation with the international court, which will pave the way for the extradition of its former military leader Ratko Mladic and former Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic both wanted by The Hague.
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