Serbian war crimes court sentences four Serbs to 5-12 years

BELGRADE, April 10 (RIA Novosti) - Serbia's war crimes court in Belgrade sentenced four Serbs Tuesday to between five and 20 years in prison for the murder of six young Bosnian Muslims in July of 1995.

The former commander of a paramilitary unit called the Scorpions, Slobodan Medic, and his main accomplice, Branislav Medic, were each given 20 years; Pera Petrasevic, the only defendant who confessed his guilt, was given 13 years; the fourth defendant, Aleksandr Medic, received a five-year sentence; and the fifth defendant in the case, Aleksandar Vukov, was acquitted.

The main evidence in the case was a videotape recording filmed by the defendants themselves during the execution. It showed how in July of 2005, during the Srebrenica massacre in Bosnia, they first taunted the young Bosnian men and then shot them in the back as they lay in a ditch.

Judge Gordana Bozilovic Petrovic said that Slobodan Medic ordered the three defendants and the other two men to kill the captured prisoners and then remove their bodies to make it appear as if they had been killed in the fighting.