Bosnian envoy calls for Karadzic arrest

Radovan Karadzic is still wanted for alleged war crimes

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (CNN) -- The West's top envoy to Bosnia has called for the arrest of indicted war criminals and said the continued liberty of men like former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic was contributing to a climate of fear.

Wolfgang Petritsch made the remarks in a speech to the Permanent Council of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) in Vienna.

The Austrian diplomat was reporting to the security body on Bosnia's November 11 general election that boosted nationalist parties in a major disappointment to the West.

Petritsch said the arrest of Karadzic, his military chief Ratko Mladic and others indicted by a U.N. war crimes court for their role in the 1992-95 war was "fundamental to reducing the climate of fear" and creating the chance of a better future.

"A genuine breakthrough is not possible while such figures remain at large," he said.

Meanwhile a nationalist leader from the Serb area of Bosnia has said Bosnian Serbs will not react if NATO-led peacekeepers arrest Karadzic.

"Of course we will not react if that happens," Mirko Sarovic of the nationalist Serb Democratic Party (SDS), who is the vice president of Bosnia's Serb republic, told Croatian daily Slobodna Dalmacija on Sunday.

But Sarovic, who is set to become Bosnian Serb president according to preliminary results of a November 11 poll, added that any planned arrests of war crimes suspects were not part of the mandate of the NATO-led peacekeepers.

"We are against organised actions on the territory of the Serb republic, especially when it concerns secret indictments, against which we have objected a number of times,"

Karadzic is believed to be in hiding in eastern Bosnia. Mladic reportedly lives in Belgrade.

Petritsch made clear that threats of a boycott of Bosnia's future government by the nationalist Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) were unacceptable. The HDZ has accused the OSCE of bias for penalising it for violating election rules.

"Neither the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina nor the international community will accept such blackmail," Petritsch said.

He said economic reform, the return of refugees and the strengthening of state institutions were the main priorities for Bosnia, and that the first test for newly elected officials would be the adoption of a key election law.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia
NATO
OSCE - Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

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