THE HAGUE, Nov 2: The UN war crimes tribunal sentenced five Bosnian Serbs to jail terms ranging from five to 25 years on Friday for their part in a “hellish orgy of persecution” at the Omarska camp in northwestern Bosnia in 1992.

All five were found guilty on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Zoran Zigic, 43, a reserve policeman during the 1992-95 war in Bosnia, was sentenced to 25 years, while Omarska shift commander Mlado Radic, 49, was handed down a 20-year term.

Three other defendants received sentences of between five and seven years.

Thousands of Muslims and other non-Serbs were kept in the Omarska camp in horrific conditions.

Presiding judge Almiro Rodriguez recalled the television images of emaciated prisoners from the Omarska, Keraterm and Trnopolje detention camps which shocked the international community when they were broadcast in mid-1992.

It was a shocking illustration of the campaign of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia led by Bosnian Serb political and military leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, he said.

The two fugitive former leaders head The Hague’s list of most wanted war crimes suspects, accused of genocide and crimes against humanity committed during Bosnia’s 1992-95 war.

“There are certainly people whose individual responsibility is much greater then your own,” Rodriguez told the defendants, hinting at the role of leaders such as Mladic and Karadzic.

“This unquestionably plays a role in mitigating sentence,” he added.

“Omarska, Keraterm and Tronpolje camps were not an accident,” the judge said, issuing the ruling of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

“The evidence demonstrates that they were the result of an intentional policy to impose a system of discrimination against the non-Serb population of Prijedor.”

Over six thousand Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats were held in inhumane conditions in the three camps in the Prijedor area between May and the end of Aug 1992.

Living conditions at Omarska were appalling, rooms were overcrowded, detainees were fed little food, prisoners were beaten and tortured by the guards and visitors, like Zigic, the court said.

Although the defendants were not responsible for setting up the camps, judge Rodriguez told the court that the camp could not have been operated without commanders, guards and administrators.

“You participated in this hellish orgy of persecution,” he told the convicted men.

Omarska’s first commander Miroslav Kvocka, 44, was sentenced to seven years in prison, his successor Dragoljub Prcac, 64, got a five-year sentence. Shift commander Milojica Kos, 38, was sentenced to six years.

In the judgment, Rodriguez poured scorn on Prcac, who pleaded not guilty and maintained throughout the trial that his tasks in the camp were strictly administrative.

“As if the whiteness of the paper could conceal the colour of blood on the walls or the all-pervading stench,” he told the former first commander.

None of the accused showed any emotion while the verdict was being read.

The prosecution had asked for considerably higher sentences for the five defendants ranging from life imprisonment to 25 years.

But explaining the lengths of the jail terms handed down, Rodriguez said that the court did not believe the men were responsible for the conception of the camps in the Prijedor area or the decision to open them.

Florence Hartmann, a spokeswoman for the prosecution, said ICTY prosecutors were looking into the possibility of an appeal to secure longer jail terms.

“We are not so satisfied with some of the sentences. The leaders of the camps, the first commanders and the deputy commanders got quite low sentences,” she said.—AFP