Historic trial makes rape war crime

Kunarac: Raped and tortured Muslim girls and women

THE HAGUE -- Three former Bosnian Serbs soldiers face a total of 60 years in prison after a historic trial which legally recognised sex abuse as a war crime for the first time.

Dragoljub Kunarac, Radomir Kovac and Zoran Vukovic were among Serb troops who used rape as an instrument of terror in the village of Foca during the war in Bosnia, Judge Florence Mumba said at the U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague.

The trio, convicted of crimes against humanity, were found guilty of a range of crimes, including rape and sexual enslavement after a 10-month trial that heard harrowing evidence from their Muslim victims.

One charge heard by the court involved the sexual abuse of a girl aged 12, while another related to the rape of a 15-year-old.

RESOURCE U.N. Int'l Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (FindLaw*) *Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader     ALSO  • The impact of the ruling  • Timeline 1945-2000  • Message board  • Shrinking of Yugoslavia     AUDIO CNN's Christiane Amampour: First time sexual enslavement is condemned as a crime against humanity 546Kb/51 sec. AIFF or WAV sound Judge sentences Dragoljub Kunarac 314K/29 sec. AIFF or WAV sound Judge sentences Radomir Kovac 262K/24 sec. AIFF or WAV sound Judge sentences Zoran Vukovic 356K/33 sec. AIFF or WAV sound Terry Taylor, Intl. Inst. for Strategic Studies: It can prevent these terrible things from happening in the first place 681K/63 sec. AIFF or WAV sound

The trial concentrated on rapes and torture carried out by paramilitary forces in Foca after it was overrun by Bosnian Serbs in April 1992.

Kunarac was found guilty of 11 charges of raping and torturing Muslim girls and women during the 1992-95 conflict and sentenced to 28 years in jail.

Kovac was sentenced to 20 years in jail on four charges, including sexually abusing a 12-year-old girl.

Vukovic, was sentenced to 12 years' imprisonment on four charges, including the rape of a 15-year-old girl -- who was about the same age as his own daughter.

Sentencing, Judge Mumba said the trio were not the "political or military masterminds" behind the conflicts but equally were not just "following orders" as they had exercised free will.

She said: "The three accused are not ordinary soldiers, whose morals were merely loosened by the hardships of war… they thrived in the dark atmosphere of the dehumanisation of those believed to be enemies."

She also warned that the sentences should send a clear warning to others: "Lawless opportunists should expect no mercy, no matter how low their position in the chain of command may be."

Christiane Amanpour, CNN's Chief International Correspondent, who covered the Bosnian conflict and was in court on Thursday, said the ruling set an important precedent.

She said rape had been clearly established as a war crime when used as an instrument of war and a crime against humanity when it was widespread and systematic.

In all, 16 women gave graphic evidence to the court, telling how Bosnian Serb paramilitary soldiers selected women and young girls for nightly gang rapes and sexual torture at detention centres.

Many of the victims said they now had long-lasting gynaecological damage and other injuries, in many cases causing permanent infertility.

"I think that for the whole of my life, all my life, I will feel the pain that I felt then," said one woman, who was 15 at the time.

The judge said Kunarac had taunted one of his victims by telling her she would carry Serb babies and would not know who the father was because of the number of men who had raped her.

Vukovic (left) and Kovac: Sentenced to 15 years and 12 years respectively

"You abused and ravaged Muslim women because of their ethnicity, and from among their number you picked whomsoever you fancied," Mumba said.

Kovac, she said, had forced women to dance naked on tables and reserved one woman for himself, repeatedly raping her.

Human rights groups say that in the course of the war in Bosnia tens of thousands of women were raped.

Terry Taylor, of the London-based strategic think-tank, the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told CNN: "These men were involved in only a fraction of the cases of rape of women in terrible circumstances.

"These verdicts may encourage other women to come forward and give evidence.

"I think the tribunal has been extremely successful. It's tackling people at all levels -- we have had generals and lower ranks of soldiers facing convictions.

"But there are still major players to be brought to account and there is still a long way to go."

Those indicted but still at large include the former Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic - for his part in the Bosnian conflict -- and ex-Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, who is wanted for alleged crimes against humanity in Kosovo.

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International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia
Bosnia War Crimes Tribunal
International Institute for Strategic Studies

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