The United Nations tribunal set up in the wake of the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s has deferred to May 14 the trial of Ratko Mladic, the former Bosnian-Serb military chief who is facing charges of genocide and other war crimes.
The Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) said in a statement on Wednesday that it had changed the start date - the trial was previously expected to begin in late March - to allow both sides to complete their pre-trial preparations.
Prosecutors told the court last week that they expected to call more than 400 witnesses and present nearly 28,000 exhibits during the trial, requiring about 200 hours of tribunal time to present their case.
Mladic, 68, is accused of genocide and other crimes against Bosnian Muslims, Bosnian Croats and other non-Serb civilians between May 1992 and late 1995.
The indictment against Mladic alleges that he led forces that massacred more than 7,000 Muslim men and boys in the supposed safe haven of Srebrenica in July 1995 in the most notorious episode of the war.
The former Army chief also faces charges for the shelling and sniping of Sarajevo during the prolonged wartime siege of the city.
Besides, the indictment lists more than 70 incidents of murder in 20 municipalities across Bosnia and Herzegovina, and accuses forces under Mladic's supervision of torturing, mistreating and physically, psychologically and sexually abusing civilians confined to detention centers.
Defense lawyers had argued that the health of Mladic be considered in determining the trial's schedule, but ICTY judges said they were not convinced that his health condition required modification of the schedule.
Mladic was arrested in May last from Serbia after evading capture for 16 years. In July, at a court hearing, a plea of not guilty was entered on his behalf.
Serbian authorities arrested Goran Hadzic, the last remaining fugitive wanted by the U.N. war crimes tribunal for atrocities committed during the bloody 1991-1995 ethnic war in Croatia, in July last.
At ICTY, the 52-year-old former Croatian Serb rebel leader faces trial for murder, persecution, forcible deportation and other crimes which took place during the campaign of terror aimed at driving non-Serbs from the area controlled by his subordinates.
Serbia has been under tremendous pressure from the European Union over its failure to arrest and extradite Mladic and Hadzic. The EU had set their arrests as a pre-condition for Serbia's entry into the European bloc.
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