Thursday December 10, 2009 Karadzic persists with calls for immunity THE HAGUE Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic has made a renewed appeal to the UN Security Council to accept that he made a deal that should assure him immunity from a war crimes trial. Mr Karadzic, charged with 11 counts of war crimes over the 1992-95 Bosnian war, including genocide at Srebrenica, argues he entered into a secret immunity deal with former US peace envoy Richard Holbrooke on condition he disappeared from public life. Repeatedly denied Mr Holbrooke has repeatedly denied those claims and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) has also ruled that even if such an agreement existed it would not limit the court’s jurisdiction. Mr Karadzic, who faces life imprisonment over such events as the 43-month siege of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo which began in 1992, has denied all charges and boycotted the first three days of his trial to demand more preparation time. On Monday, the ICTY rejected a motion lodged by Karadzic challenging the legitimacy of the court. In a letter to the United Nations Security Council — made public by the Hague-based tribunal on Tuesday — Mr Karadzic urged the UN body to recognise his pact with Holbrooke. “It has now been more than 13 years since I honoured my agreement with Richard Holbrooke and resigned my functions and withdrew from public life. It is high time that the Security Council honoured its part of the agreement,” Karadzic wrote. Mr Karadzic noted that the Security Council had not replied to a similar letter he wrote in October. Security Council diplomats and U.N. officials have previously said Karadzic’s request was absurd and would likely be ignored. One senior UN official described Karadzic’s first request in October as “preposterous”. By failing to recognise the pact, Mr Karadzic said the Security Council would be sending a message to world leaders “that no agreements with diplomats sent to a region to end a crisis can be relied upon.” (Reuters) http://www.nation.co.ke/News/world/-/1068/820250/-/u2bukg/-/
