LAJCAK WELCOMES ARREST OF SERBIAN WAR CRIMINAL RADOVAN KARADZIC

SARAJEVO, Bosnia (July 24,2008) - The International Community's High Representative and EU Special Representative in Bosnia, Miroslav Lajčák, has welcomed the long awaited arrest of Serbian war criminal Radovan Karadzic, since 1995 indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and other war crimes committed during the 1992-1995 Serbian aggression against Bosnia.

“The news that Radovan Karadzic has been arrested is positive for Bosnia and for the whole region. This arrest proves that justice reaches everyone. Nobody is untouchable. Although two indictees, Ratko Mladic and Goran Hadzic, still remain at large, the arrest of Karadzic can be viewed as the beginning of the end of the most tragic chapter in Bosnia’s modern history,” Lajčák said.

He said that although justice in the Serbian war criminal Radovan Karadzic case has been delayed it has not been denied.

“Karadzic’s continuing liberty has been an affront to justice and a challenge to the domestic and international legal systems, but justice will now take its course – and that is a matter of the greatest political importance and respect not just for the people of Bosnia but for all of us.”

Lajčák described Serbian war criminal Radovan Karadzic’s arrest as “a matter of the integrity of the rule of law” and he said it offered “fresh impetus to the region’s long march to postwar recovery and European integration.

The officials of the European Union already announced that the arrest of Serbian war criminal Radovan Karadzic will have positive consequences concerning the EU integration process of the region.”

The International Community's High Representative and EU Special Representative in Bosnia noted that Bosnia in 2008 is a very different country from the one in 1996.

“The arrest of Radovan Karadzic will help the people of Bosnia to turn from past to the future and focus on the challenges they face today,” he concluded.
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