UN war crimes trial starts against 7 Serbs

Eleven years after 8,000 Bosnian Muslims were killed at Srebrenica, a UN courthas begun the trial of seven of the alleged perpetrators.

The senior Bosnian Serb military and police officers are facing charges relating to the mass murder and ethnic cleansing of Muslims in the former Yugoslavia in 1995. The case is before the UN International War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague.

The indictment says Serb army commander Ratko Mladic and members of his staff developed a plan to murder Muslims leaving Srebrenica after the Serbs captured the city.

"The large scale systematic murder of Muslim men from Srebrenica began on the morning of 13 July at approximately 11 a.m. and continued through July 1995. At the same time, the Bosnian Serb military and police forces transported thousands of Bosnian women, children and elderly men out of the area," the prosecution alleged.

After the killings, Serb army and police officers tried to cover up the killings by reburying bodies exhumed from mass graves, the prosecution said.

Five of the seven accused face chargesincluding genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, extermination, murder, persecutions, forcible transfer and deportation.

Two others are accused of murder, persecutions, forcible transfer and deportation.

All havepleaded not guilty.

But two top Serbs implicated in the genocide, former leader Radovan Karadzic andarmy commander Mladic, are still at large.

Another man alleged to have had an important role in the slaughter,formerYugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, died in March, during his trial.

On Friday, prosecutor Carla del Ponte tried to talk about a ceremony in Srebrenica this week to mark the anniversary of the massacre. But defence lawyers objected, saying that kind of emotive statement should wait for formal opening statements, scheduled for Aug. 21.

"No emotion. Absolutely no emotion. Facts, my dear defence lawyers, facts," she replied. But the judges agreed with the defence.

The five who face charges including genocide areVujadin Popovic, Ljubisa Beara, Drago Nikolic, Ljubomir Borovcanin and Vinko Pandurevic.

The two facing the other group of charges are Radivoje Miletic and Milan Gvero.