Case Analysis: From ‘Kidnapped’ Witness to Released Accused ‘for Humanitarian Reasons’: The Case of the Late General Djordje Djukić

Extract

On 6 February 1996, the government of Bosnia and Herzegovina informed the Implementation Force (IFOR) that eight Serbs, who were reported missing since 20 January, were held in custody by the Bosnian authorities as war crimes suspects. None of them had already been indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. Among the eight detainees were two high-ranking Serb officers: General Djordje Djukić and Colonel Aleksa Krsmanovic. They were said to have been arrested accidentally by Bosnian police officers during a routine traffic control on 30 January 1996.