"At 18:30 hours on Sunday 5 March, Milan Babic, a detained witness, was found dead in his cell at the United Nations Detention Unit in Scheveningen," the ICTY said in a statement.
The Dutch authorities, who were called immediately, they confirmed that the cause of death was suicide, the ICTY said.
The Tribunal convicted Milan Babic to 13 years imprisonment for crimes committed against non-Serb civilians in the self-proclaimed Serb political entity in eastern Croatia (the Serbian Autonomous Region of Krajina, which later became the Republic of Serbian Krajina).
After the Appeals Chamber confirmed Milan Babic"s sentence, he was transferred to serve his sentence abroad.
Milan Babic, who held a number of high-level political positions in the Croatian Serb entity including the presidency, pleaded guilty on 27 January 2004 to participating in a plan to forcibly and permanently remove the non-Serb population from this area. The crimes he admitted to include murder, deportation or forcible transfer, and unlawful imprisonment of non-Serb civilians, as well as the destruction of their property.
Milan Babic was testifying in the case against Milan Martic, another former high-level official of the Croatian Serb political entity charged with crimes against non-Serb civilians. Milan Babic, who began his testimony on 15 February 2006, was scheduled to take the witness stand again today, but the session has been cancelled.
Babic had previously testified in the case against Slobodan Miloševic from 18 November until 9 December 2002.