Bosnia and Herzegovina Serbian Leader Biljana Plavsic Died in Belgrade

Former Bosnian Serb leader Biljana Plavsic, who was one of the key political figures along with Bosnian Serb war criminals Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic during the period of genocide and ethnic cleansing against Muslim Bosnians in Bosnia and Herzegovina, died in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia.

Upon the news of Plavsic's death, former President of the Republika Srpska Entity, Milorad Dodik, said that the former war criminal leader will be buried at a ceremony to be held in Banja Luka, the administrative center of the Republika Srpska entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where Serbs live heavily.

Plavsic played an important role in the political rise of Dodik, who was dismissed last year due to his separatist steps in Bosnia and Herzegovina and violation of the decisions of the High Representative of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

PLAVSIC ACCEPTED THE ACCUSES AND RECEIVED A REDUCED PENALTY

Plavsic, who founded the "Serbian Republic" together with Karadzic, the political leader of the Serbian separatists who triggered the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and was one of the key figures in the ethnic cleansing project against Muslims, agreed with the prosecutor's office at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, where he was tried in The Hague, Netherlands, and accepted some charges and received a reduced sentence. Plavsic, who confessed to crimes of persecution based on political, religious and racial grounds in his statement in 2002, acknowledged that "thousands of innocent people" were victims of the organized and systematic attempt of the Serbs to remove Muslims and Croats from the lands they considered their own. In his speech in court, Plavsic said, "Our leadership, of which I am an indispensable part, directed the initiatives that victimized countless innocent people."

Plavsic, who was found guilty of crimes against humanity committed during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, was sentenced to 11 years in prison in 2003. Plavsic, who the court decided to have participated in ethnic segregation and persecution activities against the non-Serb population in 37 municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, was released in 2009 after completing two-thirds of his sentence in Sweden and had lived in Belgrade since then.

THE FIRST AND ONLY WOMAN CONVINCED OF WAR CRIMES IN THE HAGUE

Plavsic, who was praised by former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, was the first and only woman convicted of war crimes in The Hague. Plavsic, whose two genocide charges and 7 other war crime charges were dropped as a result of an agreement with the prosecutor's office, was known as one of the biggest advocates of ethnic cleansing as part of the "Greater Serbia" ideal. Former Yugoslavian President and former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic also accused Plavsic of being too radical and said that "he should be admitted to a mental hospital."