The UN war crimes court for former Yugoslavia descends into chaos during its last judgment when a Bosnian Croat defendant appeared to take poison to protest the upholding of his 20-year jail term.
UN judges were handing down judgment in the appeals case of six former Bosnian Croat political and military leaders, in the court’s final verdict for war crimes committed during the bloody 1990s breakup of Yugoslavia.
Seconds after his sentence was upheld, former military commander Slobodan Praljak, 72, shouts out angrily: “Praljak is not a criminal. I reject your verdict.”
He then raises a small brown bottle to his lips and drinks it down in full view of the cameras filming the hearing.
The unprecedented scenes came just after the judges also upheld a 25-year prison term against Jadranko Prlic, the former prime minister of a breakaway Bosnian Croat statelet, and a 20-year term for its former defense minister Bruno Stojic.
But the hearing was then quickly suspended as Praljak’s lawyer shouts out: “My client says he has taken poison.”
— AFP
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