Radovan Karadžić

Former Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic and the wartime commander of the Bosnian Serb Army's Sarajevo-Romanija Corps, Stanislav Galic, have both been convicted by the Hague Tribunal of having command responsibility for the attack, but none of the direct perpetrators of the shelling have faced justice yet.

Radovan Karadzic's lawyer Peter Robinson told BIRN that the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals decided earlier this month to temporarily allow UN Detention Unit prisoners to make video calls to immediate relatives after the former Bosnian Serb political leader appealed to the UN court.

Former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic's defence lawyers have requested that appeals hearings scheduled for June 16 and 17 at the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague be postponed because of restrictions on cross-border movement imposed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

These are just a few examples of respectful tributes that have been paid to war crimes defendants and convicts in public spaces in Bosnia and Herzegovina over the past few years.

"Not only does [genocide denial] cause unimaginable pain for those who have survived genocide and for those who have lost love ones, it is one of the most reliable portents of future violence," she said.

Carmel Agius, the president of the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, ordered the UN court's registrar to institute a video communications service for detainees such as former Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic by May 14.

To understand how important this was, one has to know that the Srebrenica Memorial Centre operates in a very hostile environment in Bosnia's Serb-dominated entity Republika Srpska, where denial of the Srebrenica genocide is widespread, alleged war criminals live freely, and there is little state support for truth-seeking and research of wartime crimes.

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Witness statement by Rialda Musaefendic. Photo: Screenshot

Click to enlarge
Witness statement by Rialda Musaefendic. Photo: Screenshot

Twenty-eight of her colleagues were injured in the shelling of the RTV building, and one lost his life.

The Association of Defence Counsel Practising Before the International Courts and Tribunals urged the UN's Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague on Friday to free elderly war crime convicts to help ensure that they are not infected with the COVID-19 virus.

The Bosnian state prosecution investigated 58 people for offering financial support to Karadzic, but its probe was discontinued several years ago because there was no proof that any crimes were committed, and the people under investigation cooperated with the Hague Tribunal.