MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Serbian war criminal accepts extradition to Holland

Serbian war criminal Milan Lukic, 37, accused of the murder of hundreds of Muslim during the Balkans conflict agreed Tuesday to be extradited and face charges before a United Nations tribunal in The Hague.

Judicial sources in Buenos Aires where he was arrested Monday said Lukic admitted having false documents and is currently under custody of the Argentine Federal Police. In a court appearance Milan Lukic dismissed allegations he committed atrocities during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war.

"I want to tell the truth and remove this stain from my life because I've been accused of something I did not do" said Lukic, adding he was willing to be sent before the International Criminal Tribunal at The Hague.

Serbian officials say Lukic led a paramilitary group known as The Avengers or White Eagles and was in the list of the ten most wanted for crimes committed during the 1992/95 Bosnian conflict.

He had been on the run for years before his arrest on Monday.

In 1992, he was convicted for the murders of 16 Muslims and sentenced in absentia by a Belgrade court to 20 years in prison. In that case, Muslim men and women were kidnapped from a bus and their bodies later thrown into a river.

Lukic faces other charges, including an indictment by a UN war crimes court blaming him for "the extermination of a significant number of Bosnian Muslim civilians, including women, children and the elderly".

Judicial sources said that the extradition should be "quite expedient" since the case is covered by the Rome Treaty which refers to suspects of crimes against humanity.

Apparently the Argentine intelligence services together with Interpol and the Federal Police had been on the trail of Lukic and his wife for some time.

The Buenos Aires press reports that when arrested and driven in a patrol car he was asked about his profession and he replied in a coarse Spanish, "I'm a policeman, but a tough one, not like you".

This is the second arrest this year in Argentina of a Balkans' war criminal: last May Nebjosa Minic accused of murdering Albanese citizens was arrested in Mendoza.