Croatia moves to withdraw Serbian war crime rulings

The Croatian government on Thursday backed a draft law annulling all Serbian rulings on Croatian nationals linked to war crimes during the 1990s conflict. The law, which yet has to be adopted by the parliament, proclaims “null and void all legal acts” related to the 1991-1995 war, in which Croatian nationals are “suspected, indicted or sentenced” for war crimes. The new law will state that only local judiciaries can prosecute Croatian nationals suspected of war crimes. Croatia has stressed that the measure does not in any way change Zagreb’s co-operation with the UN war crimes court. “Everyone who committed a crime during the war in Croatia has to be held accountable,” Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor told a cabinet session. But she stressed that, “no country has the right ...to interfere in issues that are in the exclusive jurisdiction of each sovereign country.” The proposal comes as Croatia is preparing for general elections in early December and after several officials and a group of veterans received Serbian war crimes indictments dating from the 1990s this month. The Gulf Today