Franko Simatović

A former Yugoslav People’s Army colonel told the UN court in The Hague that he saw Serbian security chiefs Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic in 1991 in the Knin area, where crimes against Croats were committed.

The defence lawyer for former security official Franko Simatovic told the Hague Tribunal that a witness’s claim that the Serbian State Security Service was a protagonist in the Croatian war in 1991 was false.

THE HAGUE - A retrial of Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic, former top officials of the Serbian state security service, began in The Hague on Tuesday before the UN Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, the legal successor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

At the retrial of former Serbian security chiefs Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic in The Hague, prosecutors said they were superior officers to units that committed grave crimes in Bosnia and Croatia.

As the retrial of former security chiefs Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic began in The Hague, prosecutors said they were “key participants” in a joint criminal enterprise to dominate parts of Croatia and Bosnia.

The retrial of former Serbian state security officials Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic, who are accused of war crimes in Bosnia and Croatia, will open at the UN court on Tuesday.

A United Nations court on May 22 ordered two former Serbian state security officials to be held in jail until their retrial starts next month.

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) said it has asked Serbia's Ministry of Internal Affairs to return Jovica Stanisic, 66, and his deputy, Franko Simatovic, 67, to the UN Detention Unit in The Hague by May 30.

The trial of Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic, also known as Frenki, before the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, is due to begin on June 13, the Trial Chamber has announced.

The Hague Tribunal (ICTY) on Tuesday granted Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic provisional release pending the beginning of their retrial in The Hague.

The decision neither specifies a date nor a deadline for their return, the chairman of Serbia's national council for cooperation with the ICTY, Rasim Ljajic, told Tanjug.

Former Serbian state security officers Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic, who will be retried in The Hague for war crimes in Bosnia and Croatia, are to be temporarily released.