Well, that’s one way to deal with your own prosecution for serious war crimes. The wartime commander of Bosnian Croat forces, Slobodan Praljak literally drank poison during his trial in The Hague after a United Nations judge turned down his appeal against a 20-year prison sentence for war crimes.
Praljak, 72, was convicted for his campaign to drive Muslims out of a proposed out of a proposed Bosnian Croat ministate in Bosnia during the early 1990s. His appeal did result in a few of his convictions being overturned, but left his sentence unchanged.
When the verdict was handed down, Praljak was seen to tilt his head back and drink from a bottle. “I just drank poison,” he said. “I am not a war criminal. I oppose this conviction.”
Dutch police, an ambulance and a fire truck quickly arrived at the court, and Praljak was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he died.
Praljak’s hearing was the last of a mammoth tribunal which was set up in 1993 while fighting persisted in the former Yugoslavian states. The tribunal indicted 161 suspects and convicted 90 of them. Just last week, former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic was found guilty of genocide and sentenced to life in prison for his role in ethnic cleansing and massacres during the Bosnian War.
