Karadzic lived undercover in Belgrade, Serbs say (2nd Roundup)

Jul 22, 2008, 13:10 GMT

The composite photo shows the former leader of Bosnian Serbs Radovan Karadzic At left an undated photo published during a press conference in Belgrade, Serbia, 22 July 2008 and at right Karadzic seen during a public appearance in Belgrade, Serbia, 22 April 1994. Karadzic, who is accused of war crimes by the UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, was arrested on Monday, 21 July 2008. EPA/Sulejmanovic/Suki

Belgrade - Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic took a false name, worked as a doctor and changed his appearance, allowing him to live unrecognized in the Serbian capital before his arrest on war crimes charges, authorities said Tuesday.

Hours after Karadzic's 12 years on the run ended with his capture on a Belgrade-area bus, a local judge ordered him extradited to the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague to face charges including genocide stemming from Bosnia's 1992-95 war. Karadzic's lawyer said he would appeal.

European leaders praised the arrest, a condition for the Balkan nation to join the European Union. Karadzic's former military chief Ratko Mladic remained at large, but a Serb official pledged to press ahead with the hunt.

'We are still reconstructing Karadzic's movement and will use that to arrest the remaining fugitives,' said Rasim Ljajic, Serbia's top official for cooperation with the war crimes tribunal.

Karadzic, 63, 'was found while we were tracking Mladic's helpers,' Ljajic told reporters in Belgrade. He did not elaborate.

Serb officials released a photo showing Karadzic, once clean- shaven and wavy-haired, with a long white mane, a beard and glasses. He lived under a false name in Belgrade and practiced alternative medicine for a private ambulance company, Serbian war crimes prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic said.

'His false identity was so convincing,' he told reporters. 'He moved freely around town, appeared in public places and worked for a private ambulance company. People didn't recognize him.'

Serb authorities arrested Karadzic, a trained psychiatrist, late Monday while he was travelling in Belgrade, Ljajic said.

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has indicted Karadzic on charges including genocide and crimes against humanity for the brutal ethnic cleansing of non-Serbs during the Bosnian war, which killed 100,000 people.

He is charged with ordering the 1995 massacre at Srebrenica, where Bosnian Serbs killed thousands of Bosnian Muslim men and boys. Yet he remains a patriotic hero to many Serbs, and hardline nationalist politicians in Serbia denounced his arrest.

Karadzic 'called the whole case a farce' and remained silent during an initial hearing in front of a Belgrade magistrate, his lawyer Svetozar Vujacic told the Beta news agency.

Karadzic maintains he was arrested Friday night when security forces grabbed him off a suburban bus near Belgrade and pulled a cap over his face, the lawyer said, but Serb officials insisted he was captured Monday.

European Union leaders welcomed the arrest, which came two weeks after a new pro-European government took power in Belgrade.

'Finally, finally - thirteen years,' exclaimed French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner.

At issue right now is a pre-membership Stabilization and Association Agreement with Serbia, which the EU will approve only once the chief war crimes prosecutor certifies full Serbian cooperation with the tribunal.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana congratulated the Serbian government and said he was confident that the ICTY's chief prosecutor, Serge Brammertz, would give Serbia the nod.

'I think we have to talk to the international prosecutor, and I am certain that he is going to say there is full cooperation,' Solana said Tuesday in Brussels.

But he warned that other suspects at large, including Mladic, must be captured and turned over to The Hague. Also on the list is Goran Hadzic, who led rebel Serbs in Croatia during the 1990s.

Serbia's new pro-Western Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic urged the two remaining suspects to surrender, saying Tuesday it would be 'good for them and the Serbian people.'

In Bosnia, non-Serb leaders welcomed the news.        

'This is at least some satisfaction for the families of the victims of the war,' said Haris Silajdzic, the Muslim member of Bosnia's three-member presidency. 'This cleansing is necessary so people know there is justice.'

Karadzic is accused of masterminding Europe's bloodiest fighting since World War II.

Bosnian Serb troops directed by Karadzic and Mladic launched what came to be called ethnic cleansing, terrorizing and killing Bosnian Muslims and Croats and besieging Sarajevo. Karadzic set up headquarters in Pale, a ski resort outside Sarajevo, and attended international peace talks while the fighting raged.

With shifting alliances between the three sides, the war raged until US-led mediators ended the fighting in the Dayton peace agreement.

The peace deal set up a Serb republic and a Muslim-Croat federation on Bosnian soil. Karadzic gave up his post of Bosnian Serb leader and went into hiding and was last openly seen in public in July 1996.