The Hague, 31 May 2023 (dpa/MIA) – The UN Yugoslavia war crimes tribunal increased the sentences of two former heads of Serbia's state security services to 15 years on Wednesday in its final ruling almost three decades after the end of the Bosnian War.

Jovica Stanišić, 72, and Franko Simatović, 73, had been handed 12-year sentences in 2021 at their initial trial. Increasing the sentences on appeal, presiding judge Graciela Gatti Santana said the tribunal was marking a "milestone."

Stanišić and Simatović were found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including murder, deportation, forcible transfer and persecution.

They formed a "joint criminal enterprise" whose objective "was the forcible and permanent removal of the majority of non-Serbs from large areas in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina," the indictment said.

The appeal chamber ruled that the accused's guilt had been proved in other locations as well and accepted the application by the prosecution for an increase in sentence. The defence claimed that the defendants' role had been considerably less than charged.

Stanišić was head of the state security service and Simatović was his deputy. Both men were close to Slobodan Milošević, president of Serbia at the time.

They were both initially acquitted by the tribunal, but that ruling was overturned in 2015 and a fresh trial ordered. Their time in custody will be taken into account in the sentence.

The tribunal, formally the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, was the first international court to try war crimes in Europe since the Nuremberg Trials that directly followed World War II. It was set up in 1993 under a UN Security Council resolution.

Photo: MIA archive