A Serbian plane believed to be carrying former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic landed Wednesday in the Netherlands, where a UN war crimes tribunal will try him for genocide. The white business jet with Serbian government markings taxied into a hangar at Rotterdam airport, out of view of reporters and television cameras, before anyone disembarked.
Less than 45 minutes later, two black minivans with lights flashing drove through the gates of the detention center near The Hague. Karadzic faces 11 counts including genocide, extermination and persecution. Prosecutors allege he masterminded atrocities including the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica and the deadly siege of Sarajevo.
Trip from Belgrade to Holland (Photo: Reuters)
Karadzic was flown from Belgrade, where he had been detained after Serbian officials said they took him into custody July 21.
The 63-year-old Karadzic will undergo a registration process at the detention center to confirm his identity and inform him of his rights. Under normal procedure, he would be fingerprinted, photographed and have an initial medical checkup.
The jail of the UN Yugoslav tribunal is in a separate wing of a Dutch maximum security prison in Scheveningen, a coastal suburb of The Hague, a short commute by prison car to the court where Karadzic will stand trial. He is expected to be summoned before a judge within a day or two and will be asked to enter a plea to each of the 11 charges. He may postpone his plea for up to 30 days, however.
It is likely to be several months before the trial begins, and could take several years before it concludes. Until his arrest, Karadzic had been living in an outlying Belgrade suburb under the false name of Dragan Dabic working as an alternative healer. His bouffant mane of salt and pepper hair - his trademark during the Bosnian war - had gone, replaced by flowing white hair and a beard that drew comparisons with Santa Claus and Russian mystic Rasputin.
Since his capture Karadzic has asked for and gotten a shave and a haircut and his lawyer says he looks like an older version of the Bosnian Serb leader who regularly met with top Western officials, diplomats and military commanders during the 1992-95 Bosnian war. During the war he was known as the urbane, intellectual face of a monstrous regime blamed for the worst atrocities in Europe since World War II.
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