THE HAGUE, March 31 (Hina) - Former Bosnian Serb special police commander Darko Mrdja was sentenced to 17 years in prison before the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague on Wednesday for taking part in the killing of more than 200
unarmed Bosnian Muslim and other non-Serb civilians on Mount Vlasic in August 1992.
THE HAGUE, March 31 (Hina) - Former Bosnian Serb special police
commander Darko Mrdja was sentenced to 17 years in prison before the
UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague on Wednesday for taking part in
the killing of more than 200 unarmed Bosnian Muslim and other non-Serb
civilians on Mount Vlasic in August 1992.#L#
On 24 June 2003 Mrdja admitted guilt for the killings as violations of
the laws and customs of war and inhumane treatment.
During the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Mrdja commanded a special police
intervention platoon in the northwestern town of Prijedor.
Judge Alphonse Orie said that Mrdja was not an architect of the
large-scale murder of Muslim and other non-Serb civilians near the
village of Ilomska Rijeka in the summer of 1992, adding that he had
acted on orders.
It was said that the punishment must reflect all the cruelty and
inhumanity of Mrdja's direct participation in the shooting of more
than 200 civilians.
(Hina) vm sb