Bosnian Serb moved to Hague court

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands -- A Bosnian Serb wartime commander has been transferred to the United Nations war crimes tribunal to face genocide charges.

Colonel Vidoje Blagojevic, a former commander in the eastern Bosnian town of Bratunac, was arrested by British NATO forces earlier on Friday.

He arrived in the U.N. detention unit near The Hague, Netherlands, about eight hours after his arrest.

IN-DEPTH Srebrenica: Five days of evil   • Survivor's Story   • Gallery   • Massacre background   • Rebuilding Srebrenica   • Prayers for the dead   • Grief of the widows   • Mass grave found   • War crimes defendants   • Profile: Radko Mladic   • Profile: Radovan Karadzic

Blagojevic was secretly indicted alongside Bosnian Serb General Radislav Krstic in November 1998. He was charged with eight counts of war crimes for genocide, complicity to genocide, extermination, murder, persecution, deportation and inhumane acts against Muslims in the former U.N. enclave of Srebrenica in the summer of 1995.

The tribunal for war crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia gained its first genocide conviction just over a week ago, finding Krstic guilty of the massacre of 8,000 men and boys from Srebrenica in July 1995. In the first ruling to classify the events in Bosnia as genocide, Krstic was sentenced to 46 years in prison.

Blagojevic commanded troops in the Drina Corps, which operated under Krstic's command, the indictment said.

NATO: 'Turn yourself in'

In one of the most gruesome events detailed in the indictment, Bosnian Serb soldiers, allegedly under Blagojevic's command, slaughtered hundreds of Muslim prisoners in the infamous Kravica warehouse massacre on July 13.

The Bratunac brigade was also responsible for other executions around Srebrenica, prosecutors allege.

Blagojevic was arrested earlier on Friday as he arrived for a meeting with international officials. At the time of his arrest, he was still active as the commander of engineering units in the Bosnian Serb army.

Eyewitnesses said two British military Jeeps and two civilian vehicles approached his car, pulled him out, and sped away.

NATO said in a statement that the arrest was another step in its "drive to arrest the remaining war crime indictees and reflects NATO's commitment to bringing to justice those who perpetrated war crimes and atrocities".

"There will be no hiding place for anyone accused by the (U.N. tribunal) of these horrific crimes. Let today's arrest serve as a warning to those with guilty consciences: there is no escape, turn yourself in," the NATO statement said.

In Bosnia, Mirza Hajric, former adviser to Bosnian President Alia Izetbegovic, praised the arrest, saying that this was "really becoming the year of the Hague Tribunal in Bosnia-Herzegovina."

In the past six weeks, the court has seen the transfer of five high-ranking suspects, including former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, three Muslim military leaders and a Croatian general.