France police arrest Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect News
France police arrest Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect

[JURIST] French police on Friday arrested Radomir Susnjar [Bosnia Times backgrounder], a Bosnian Serb paramilitary soldier suspected of killing 59 Muslim civilians during the Bosnian Civil War [JURIST news archive]. Susnjar is suspected of involvement in the July 1992 killings in the town of Visegrad, where 59 civilians were locked in a building that was set on fire. Susnjar was arrested [AP report] in France at the request of Bosnian authorities and will soon face extradition to Bosnia to stand trial. The Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina [official website] stated [Balkan Insight report] that Susnjar’s arrest is a “clear message to all war crimes suspects that the Bosnian prosecutor’s office and police agencies will find and prosecute suspects wherever they hide.” The killings in Visegrad were among the first carried out by Serb forces in the war.

In January Ratko Mladic [JURIST news archive], former leader of the Bosnian Serb army during the Bosnian civil war, refused to testify [JURIST report] in the war crimes trial of fellow Bosnian Serb military leader Radovan Karadzic [BBC profile]. Earlier that month the appeals chamber for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website] upheld [JURIST report] the war crimes convictions of four Serbian military officials, but reduced the sentences for three of them. The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) [official website] in December 2013 rejected [JURIST report] a request by prosecutors to re-arrest nine individuals convicted of war crimes.

THIS DAY @ LAW

38 Santee Sioux hanged by US for rebellion

On December 26, 1862, 38 Santee Sioux men were hanged in a mass execution for their roles in a rebellion against US authorities in Minnesota which left hundreds dead and made refugees of some 40,000 white settlers. Government annuities promised under a treaty with the Sioux had failed to arrive on schedule and credit for purchases was not advanced in the meantime, threatening the tribe with starvation. The Santee Sioux Tribe's members were deported first to South Dakota and ultimately to Nebraska, where they remain today. Learn more about the 1862 Minnesota Sioux Rebellion.

Louis XVI put on trial during French Revolution

On December 26, 1792, Romain de Sèze, a defense attorney for deposed King Louis XVI, presented a defense of his client. The former King was on trial before a French Revolutionary court on thirty-three charges, including treason and other crimes against the state. He was convicted on January 15, 1793 executed by guillotine on the following January 21.