Landmark Srebrenica war crimes case halts over technicality in Serbia justice system

by Sutharshan
Jul 14, 2017

A Serbian appeals court on Thursday halted a landmark trial against eight former Bosnian Serb police officers charged with taking part in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, reports abc news.

The court, on Thursday, said it had accepted the defence’s contention that the charges against the eight officers were invalid, because they were filed at a time when Serbia did not have a chief war crimes prosecutor.

The appeals court added that in the Serbian justice system only a war crimes prosecutor can file war crimes indictments and conduct investigations.

This technicality will mean that the whole proceeding would need to be dropped and start again with a fresh indictment from Serbia’s war crimes prosecutor.

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