January 11, 2000
Web posted at: 4:56 a.m. EST (0956 GMT)

In this story: Court pushing for first genocide conviction Pair face life in prison RELATED STORIES, SITES

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (CNN) -- Two former Bosnian Serb officials accused of organizing the expulsion of Croats and Muslims from northwestern Bosnia in 1992 pleaded not guilty Tuesday to 11 new war crimes charges -- including the highest count of genocide.

During previous appearances at the war crimes tribunal, former Deputy Prime Minister Radoslav Brdjanin and military chief Momir Talic pleaded not guilty to lesser counts including crimes against humanity.

Prosecutors decided last month to increase the charges against the pair, two of the highest-ranking officials to appear before the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia.

The two are accused of masterminding a campaign in which thousands were tortured, murdered or expelled from the Prijedor region in northwest Bosnia in 1992.

The prosecution is the court's latest push to win its first genocide conviction. It stems from what U.N. prosecutors consider one of the bloodiest "ethnic cleansing" campaigns of the Bosnian war. The purge drove 100,000 people from their homes and left a trail of hundreds of dead bodies.

The case against Talic and Brdjanin is pivotal for prosecutors at the tribunal, who have failed to make genocide charges stick in the seven years since the U.N. court was established to bring justice to the Balkans.

Talic, appointed Bosnian Serb military chief-of-staff in 1998, and Brdjanin, a former deputy prime minister, were summoned to enter pleas on the charges at a pretrial hearing on their joint indictment.

Talic and Brdjanin "individually and in concert planned, instigated, ordered, committed or otherwise aided or abetted" a campaign to commit genocide, the indictment states.

If found guilty, the men face life terms in a European prison. The tribunal has no death penalty.

The Yugoslav tribunal was convened in 1993 to try suspects of atrocities in the ethnic conflicts set in motion by the breakup of Yugoslavia.

International panels of judges have convicted eight Serbs, Croats and Muslims of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Two attempts to prosecute on genocide failed due to insufficient evidence and the death in custody of a defendant.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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