(Image Source: HRT)

BY ANTOINE MOTANDO

A United Nations tribunal has sentenced former Yugoslav Army chief of staff, General Momcilo Perisic to 27 years in prison for crimes in the Balkan war.

euronews has the details.

“The UN tribunal in the Hague jailed him for aiding and abetting in murders, persecutions and attacks on civilians in Croatia and Bosnia in the 1990s. That includes the Sarajevo siege and the Srebrenica massacre.“

Unlike General Ratko Mladic, the 67 year-old Perisic did not personally participate in the crimes but was found criminally responsible. Al Jazeera explains...

“The tribunal found evidence that Perisic had had a ‘collaborative relationship’ with Bosnian Serb military commander General Ratko Mladic, and ‘substantially aided his operations’. Perisic had kept General Mladic on the Yugoslav Army payroll list, and personally signed Mladic's promotion to the rank of colonel general in 1994.”

News of the verdict sparked mixed reactions across the Balkans. Univision reports-- in Serbia, the Defense Minister is one among many who find the sentence quote “excessive”.

"I regret this extremely high sentence…This verdict could open old wounds and if we are trying to move towards reconciliation, any return to the past like this is bad.”

But Channel reports-- in Bosnia, where there are many survivors of the war crimes, many believe the sentence is too mild.
 

In Bosnia the sentence was slammed, with Srebrenica massacre survivors also saying it would not contribute to reconciliation in the volatile Balkan region.”

Still- there are those who find the sentence fair. Natasa Kandic, a prominent human rights activist from Serbia, tells HRT…

“The verdict is appropriate and corresponds to the crimes he was found guilty of.”

Perisic is the first Belgrade official to be convicted for Serbia's role in the wars in Bosnia and Croatia.