War crimes suspect surrenders

BANJA LUKA, Bosnia (Reuters) -- A commander of a Bosnian Serb wartime
prison camp where several hundred Muslims were killed has surrendered,
Bosnian Serb police said on Saturday.

Savo Todovic helped run a camp in Foca, an eastern town in which some
1,500 Muslims were killed early in the 1992-95 Bosnian war. The exact
number of those killed inside the camp has never been determined but
exceeds 300.

Todovic has already been transferred to the U.N. war crimes tribunal
in the Hague, where he is now being held, a prosecution spokeswoman
at the tribunal said.

Earlier, the Bosnian Serb Republic's Interior Ministry said in a
statement Todovic had "voluntarily surrendered on the territory
of the Republika Srpska."

Todovic has been charged on 18 counts of crimes against humanity,
violations of the laws and customs of war and grave breaches of
international conventions.

The number of inmates at his camp rose to 760 at one point and
about 300 still remain unaccounted for.

The U.N. war crimes tribunal's indictment said he was "in charge
of selecting detainees for killings, beatings, interrogations,
forced labor, solitary confinement and exchanges."

He was charged together with Foca detention camp commander Milorad
Krnojelac -- snatched by NATO troops in 1998 -- and fellow camp guards
commander Mitar Rasevic, who gave himself in to Serbian authorities
in 2003.

Rasevic is awaiting trial while Krnojelac was sentenced to 15 years
in prison.

After Todovic's surrender, 18 publicly indicted war crimes suspects
remain at large, including 12 Bosnian Serbs.

Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic and his ex-military commander
Ratko Mladic top the list. They were both indicted twice for genocide,
for the 1995 massacre of about 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica and the
3-1/2 year-long siege of Sarajevo.

Bosnian Serb authorities have issued several calls to publicly indicted
fugitives to surrender. In December, they even offered them and their
families financial reward for prompt surrender but to no avail.
_______________________________________________________________________
Agence France-Presse
January 15, 2005

Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect surrenders, is transferred to The Hague

THE HAGUE (AFP) -- A Bosnian Serb wanted on charges of killing and torture
of prisoners in a concentration camp during the 1990s was transferred
to The Hague Saturday for trial before a war crimes tribunal after
giving himself up.

A Bosnian police officer said in Banja Luka Savo Todovic, wanted by the
International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for war
crimes and crimes against humanity during the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia,
had turned himself in to the Bosnian Serb interior ministry.

Bosnian Serb Interior Minister Darko Matijasevic had then personally
accompanied the accused to The Hague.

The Hague tribunal has charged Todovic with crimes against humanity and
war crimes for the killing, torture and inhuman treatment of mainly Muslim
prisoners at Foca concentration camp, where he was deputy commander in
1992 and 1993.

According to the indictment, Todovic, 52, was in charge of selecting
detainees for killings, beatings, interrogations, forced labour and
solitary confinement.

Serbian police tried without success to arrest him during a swoop in
June last year. The Bosnian Serb administration has been under strong
international pressure to start cooperating with the tribunal, after
allowing some of the most brutal alleged war criminals to walk free.

Last month the Bosnian Serb government agreed to give financial
support to ICTY suspects on the run in return for giving themselves up.
Todovic is the first to turn himself in since this offer was made.

The indictment says: "Most, if not all, detainees were civilians
who had not been charged with any crime".

It said they were "mostly Muslim men from 16 to 80 years' of
age, including mentally handicapped, physically disabled and
seriously ill persons."

Since the war Bosnia forms two entities, the Serbs' Republika Srpska and
the Croat-Muslim Federation, with weak central institutions in Sarajevo.

Under strong international pressure the Bosnian Serb authorities
have arrrested a dozen indiviuals wanted by local Bosnian courts on
war crimes charges.

But this still remains the only component of the former Yugoslavia
not to have arrested a single suspect wanted by The Hague.

Dragan Mikerevic, premier of the Bosnian Serb Republic, resigned
last month in protest at pressures and international sanctions
including freezing assets and refusal to his senior government
officials of admission to the European Union and the United States.

The international community is particularly keen for the arrest of the
two most wanted men still at large -- former political and military chiefs
Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, wanted on genocide charges over their
alleged roles in a 1995 massacre at Srebrenica when 8,000 Bosnian Muslims
were killed by Bosnian Serb forces.
_______________________________________________________________________
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4178043.stm
BBC News | Europe Saturday, 15 January, 2005, 23:55 GMT

Bosnian Serbs hand over suspect

Bosnian Serb authorities have for the first time handed over a war crimes
suspect to the international tribunal sitting at The Hague.

Savo Todovic surrendered and was then flown to The Hague, where he was
handed over to court officials.

Mr Todovic, 52, was a commander at the Serb-run Foca camp where hundreds
of Muslims died during the Bosnian conflict from 1992 to 1995.

Several wartime Bosnian Serb leaders are wanted by The Hague tribunal.

Bosnian Serb authorities have been persistently criticised by the
international community for failing to cooperate with The Hague tribunal.

Beatings

The tribunal's most wanted men - former Bosnian Serb military and
political leaders Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic - remain at large
and are believed to be in the Bosnian Serb republic.

The Bosnian Serb news agency Srna quoted a police official as saying: "On
the territory of the Republika Srpska, Savo Todovic, originally from Foca
(in eastern Bosnia), indicted by the UN war crimes court, surrendered
voluntarily to the interior ministry."

It said Bosnian Serb Interior Minister Darko Matijasevic was accompanying
Mr Todovic to The Hague.

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has charged
Mr Todovic with crimes against humanity and war crimes allegedly committed
during his time at the Foca camp, from 1992 to 1993.

According to indictment, Mr Todovic selected detainees for beatings,
interrogations, punishments and execution.

Hundreds of inmates at the camp remain unaccounted for.