Wednesday, December 16, 1998 Published at 19:43 GMT
World: Europe
Yugoslavia refuses to
hand over war crimes
suspects
Yugoslavia has rejected a demand from the United
Nations war crimes tribunal to hand over three
former Serb army officers for trial in The Hague.
The three men Veselin Sljivancanin, Miroslav
Radic and Milan Mrksic are accused of ordering
the massacre of more than two-hundred and sixty
unarmed Croats at Vukovar, in eastern Croatia, in
1991.
They are due to appear as witnesses at a closed
hearing in a Belgrade military court tomorrow
Thursday.
Representatives of the war crimes tribunal will
attend the hearing and again demand their arrest.
If Yugoslavia fails to comply with the tribunal's
order in sixty days, the matter will be referred to
the UN Security Council.
Yugoslavia has so far refused to extradite war
crimes suspects, saying that it was against its
constitution.
From the newsroom of the BBC World Service