Bosnian Croats go on trial for ethnic cleansing

THE HAGUE - Six former top Croat officials went on trial in The Hague on Wednesday, accused of a campaign of ethnic cleansing of Bosnian Muslims in the early 1990s as part of a plan to create a greater Croatian state.

The six men surrendered voluntarily to the UN tribunal in April 2004 and pleaded not guilty to 26 charges including murder, rape, destruction of property and the deportation of Bosnian Muslims during the 1992-95 Bosnian conflict.

Prosecutor Kenneth Scott told the court the men worked with the late Croatian President Franjo Tudjman, who had long pursued plans for a "Greater Croatia", to include territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

"Muslim majorities and pluralities did not stop Tudjman in claiming those areas," he said.

At the peak of the conflict, Bosnian Croats rounded up hundreds of Muslim men and put them in squalid detention camps, which were closed later in 1993 under Western pressure.

The six defendants were high ranking military or political officials in a self-styled Bosnian Croat mini-state, including its then Prime Minister Jadranko Prlic, Defence Minister Bruno Stojic and Interior Minister Valentin Coric.

Two of the indictees, Slobodan Praljak and Milivoj Petkovic, were chiefs of the Bosnian Croat militia.

Praljak is known for ordering the shelling of a famous 16th century bridge, the Stari Most, in Mostar. It was rebuilt after the war.

The sixth accused, Berislav Pusic, was a military police commander and in charge of prisons.

A tribunal spokesman said the joint trial was due to last 46 weeks. It is the biggest trial at the Hague tribunal in terms of the number of defendants since a 1998 case, where six accused were tried over a single incident.

Under pressure to close by 2010, the UN tribunal has joined some cases to speed up hearings into crimes from the Balkan wars.

The combined trial of six Bosnian Serbs accused of genocide over the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of more than 7000 Muslims is due to begin in August.

The UN court also wants to move several mid- and low-ranking cases to national courts so it can focus on major suspects.

- REUTERS