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Agence France-Presse

Dutch prosecutors are investigating how a Bosnian Croat war criminal managed to dramatically take his own life, apparently after drinking poison he had smuggled into a UN court, in scenes that were broadcast live.
In shocking footage beamed around the world Wednesday, Slobodan Praljak drank from a small brown glass bottle and exclaimed he had taken poison moments after UN judges upheld his 20-year jail term for atrocities committed during the 1990s Balkans conflict.
The 72-year-old died in hospital after being rushed from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), casting a cloud over what should have been a successful end to the court’s tenure.
Prosecutors said their investigation would focus on what killed Praljak and whether he had received any outside help in obtaining the suspected poison.


“For the time being the inquiry will focus on assisted suicide and violation of the Medicines Act,” the Public Prosecution Service said in a statement, adding it would not be commenting further.
The unprecedented drama came as judges handed down their very last verdict at the court in the appeal case of six Bosnian Croat political and military leaders.
Praljak, a former military commander of a breakaway Bosnian Croat statelet, shouted out angrily: “Praljak is not a criminal. I reject your verdict.”
Standing tall, with a shock of white hair and beard, he then raised a small brown bottle to his lips, and tipped it into his mouth. The hearing was quickly suspended as Praljak’s lawyer interjected: “My client says he has taken poison.”
ICTY spokesman Nenad Golcevski told reporters that Praljak “quickly fell ill” and died in hospital. He could not confirm what was in the bottle.

The stunning events caused a shock wave in Croatia and intense embarrassment at a war-crimes tribunal that closes next month more than two decades after being set up at the height of the 1992-1995 Bosnian conflict.
Among the questions to be answered will be how he managed to evade tight security to smuggle the bottle into the tribunal.
And if the liquid was indeed poison or noxious, how did he acquire it in the UN detention centre in The Hague where he was being held?
Croatia’s Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic slammed the “injustice” of the UN tribunal and expressed his condolences.
“His act, which we all unfortunately witnessed today, speaks mostly about the deep moral injustice towards six Croats from Bosnia and the Croatian people,” he said.
Praljak’s act showed “what sacrifice he was ready to make” to show he was “not a war criminal,” said Dragan Covic, the Croat member of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency.

“It is a humiliation of this institution which has existed since 1993.”
Late Wednesday candles were lit in the former breakaway statelet’s capital Mostar by Bosnian Croats and other residents in tribute to the late general.
It is not the first time that defendants have taken their own lives at the ICTY.
Former Croatian Serb leader Milan Babic killed himself in his cell at the UN detention centre in 2006, after another Croatian Serb, Slavko Dokmanovic, in 1998.
And former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic was found dead in his cell in 2006 from natural causes before his trial could be completed.
In the complex ruling, the judges upheld the jail terms against all six defendants, including a 25-year sentence imposed on Jadranko Prlic, the former prime minister of the breakaway Bosnian Croat statelet, known as Herzog-Bosna.
Praljak had been specifically charged with ordering the destruction of Mostar’s 16th-century bridge in November 1993.
In their ruling, the judges allowed part of Praljak’s appeal, saying the bridge had been “a military target at the time of the attack.” But they refused to reduce his overall sentence.
The bloody 1992-1995 war in Bosnia, in which 100,000 people died and 2.2 million were displaced, mainly pitted Bosnian Muslims against Bosnian Serbs, but also saw some brutal fighting between Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats after an initial alliance fell apart.
The appeal judges said all six men, who had been found guilty of seeking to remove Bosnian Muslims from the territory, “remained convicted of numerous and very serious crimes”.
In statements sure to anger Zagreb, the judges upheld the original trial finding that the men had been part of a joint criminal enterprise whose “ultimate purpose was shared” by late Croatian president Franjo Tudjman, and other leaders.
The aim of the scheme was to set up “a Croatian entity that … facilitated the reunification of the Croatian people.”
Terms ranging from 10 to 20 years were also upheld against the four other defendants.
Wednesday’s verdict comes a week after the judges imposed a life sentence on former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic.
His judgment had also descended into confusion when he accused the judges of lying and had to be dragged away into a nearby room.
The ICTY closes its doors on December 31, having indicted and dealt with 161 people.
Additional reporting by Associated Press


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War and conflict

Horror as Bosnian Croat general commits suicide by drinking poison in UN war crimes courtroom

Slobodan Praljak, a former film and theatre director turned wartime general, was always known for theatrics

epa06357389 A series of four video stills taken from a live video feed by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) showing Bosnian Croat Slobodan Praljak, taking an unknown substance at the court in The Hague, The Netherlands, 29 November 2017, during the appeals judgement in the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), for war crimes committed during the bloody break-up of Yugoslavia. Praljak took the substance after the court ruled the 20-year sentence he received would be upheld, and claimed he took poison. EPA-EFE/ICTY HANDOUT HANDOUT EDITORIAL USE ONLY/NO SALES

Bosnian Croats and residents of Mostar, light candles in in tribute to General Slobodan Praljak, on November 29, 2017, after Bosnian Croat war criminal took his own life in front of United Nations war crimes judges, apparently drinking poison just after they upheld his 20-year jail term for atrocities committed during the Balkans conflict. / AFP PHOTO / ELVIS BARUKCIC

Bosnian Croat general Slobodan Praljak and war crimes convict drinks poison in a UN war crimes court in the Netherlands. Photo: Zuma Press/TNS

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Veselin Vlahovic is seen during his sentencing in the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Photo: Reuters

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A September 18, 1996 file photo shows International War Crimes Tribunal investigators clearing away soil and debris from a tangle of dozens of bodies of Srebrenica massacre victims buried in a mass grave near the village of Pilica. Photo: AP

Ex-Bosnian Serb wartime general Ratko Mladic reacts in court at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in the Hague, Netherlands in this still image taken from a video released by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), November 22, 2017. International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY)/Handout via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

epa06343934 A woman reads a prayer at the grave of her relative at Memorial Center in Potocari after the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) verdict to war-time Bosnian Serb General Ratko Mladic, in Srebrenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 22 November 2017. The former Bosnian Serbian commander Ratko Mladic has been sentenced to life in prison for genocide and war crimes during the Balkans war. Mladic's trial is the last major case for the Netherlands-based tribunal for former Yugoslavia, which was set up in 1993 to prosecute those most responsible for the worst carnage in Europe, since World War II. EPA-EFE/FEHIM DEMIR

Nura Mustafic, one of the Mothers of Srebrenica and other Bosnian organizations, wipes away tears as she reacts to the verdict which the Yugoslav War Crimes Tribunal, ICTY, handed down in the genocide trial against former Bosnian Serb military chief Ratko Mladic, in The Hague, Netherlands, Wednesday Nov. 22, 2017. A U.N. court has convicted former Bosnian Serb military chief Gen. Ratko Mladic of genocide and crimes against humanity and sentenced him to life in prison for atrocities perpetrated during Bosnia's 1992-1995 war. (AP Photo/Phil Nijhuis)

UN court in The Hague convicts Mladic of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide

Former Bosnian Serb military chief Ratko Mladic during an angry outburst in the Yugoslav War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague. Photo: AP

Bosnian Serb military chief Ratko Mladic during an angry outburst in the Yugoslav War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2017. The United Nations’ Yugoslav war crimes tribunal ordered Bosnian Serb military chief Gen. Ratko Mladic out of the courtroom over an angry outburst during Wednesday’s verdict determining whether he is guilty of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes over Bosnia’s devastating 1992-95 war. (ICTY via AP)

Mothers of victims pose with photos during the trial of former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic before a court at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in the Hague, Netherlands, November 22, 2017. REUTERS/Michael Kooren NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES

Members of the media watch and listen as judge Alphons Orie, on screen, continues to read the judgment after Bosnian Serb military chief Ratko Mladic was removed from the court room of the Yugoslav War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2017, during the reading of his verdict in his genocide trial. Mladic's trial is the last major case for the Netherlands-based tribunal for former Yugoslavia, which was set up in 1993 to prosecute those most responsible for the worst carnage in Europe since World War II. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)

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Slobodan Praljak, a former film and theatre director turned wartime general, was always known for theatrics


Slobodan Praljak, a former film and theatre director turned wartime general, was always known for theatrics.


International Criminal Court