U.N. targets 12 Balkans suspects
May 23, 2001The Hague, Netherlands -- Carla del Ponte, chief prosecutor for the war crimes tribunal, is pressing Belgrade to hand over Milosevic.
The United Nations war crimes tribunal has revealed it has 12 secret indictments against alleged perpetrators of Balkan atrocities.
The tribunal, based in The Hague, said it wanted to quash speculation that "most of the Serbian population is under sealed indictment".
The names of the accused and details of the indictments were not released. The 12 new arrest warrants come in addition to 26 individuals publicly indicted and still at large.
Of the 38 suspects at large, 26 are in the Serb part of Bosnia and 12 are in Yugoslavia, prosecution spokeswoman Florence Hartmann said.
The U.N. court began issuing sealed indictments because local authorities had been refusing to arrest suspects sought by the tribunal, and disclosing names served as a warning for suspects, often driving them into hiding out of reach of NATO troops.