Crimes Against Humanity.(arrest of war criminals)(Brief Article)

Radovan Karadzic and Gen. Ratko Mladic. Their names resonate in the slaughterhouse of the Balkans. For years the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia has sought their arrest and extradition to The Hague. Last week brought that day closer--perhaps very close.

The catalyst: the arrest of three senior Bosnian Muslim Army officers for war crimes, committed mainly against Croats in 1993. All three had been applauded by their countrymen as heroes in the defense of Bosnia during the war against the Serbs. Yet within days of their secret indictment two weeks ago, they were seized and, on Friday, shipped off to the Netherlands, where they joined Slobodan Milosevic and 42 others awaiting trial. Most of those are Serbs, with a few Croats. By arresting the first high-ranking Muslim commanders, the tribunal has sent an unmistakable--and critical--signal that all sides to the Balkan conflict will be judged equally.

This was in fact a subtle first step in a delicate legal and diplomatic minuet. The second, coupled with the arrests of the first top Muslim military leaders, came from the Bosnian Serb Parliament late in July. It, too, was unprecedented. A bill providing for the extradition of Serb war criminals passed its first reading and will go for a final vote in September. For all its legalese, it was a watershed: it gives moderate Bosnian Serb leaders the political cover they need to acquiesce in the arrest of two of the most important figures sought by the court besides Milosevic himself--Karadzic, the former Bosnian Serb president, and the infamous Serb military commander, Mladic. The two have eluded (or, more accurately, defied) capture for years. With last week's events, it suddenly looked certain that their long run was over- -and that they, too, would soon go to The Hague, possibly before summer is out.

For most of the world, last week's Balkan headlines reported the conviction of Mladic's ranking subordinate, Gen. Radislav Krstic, 53, the first European since the Nuremberg trials in 1946 to be convicted of genocide. Sentenced to 46 years in prison--less than the life sentence demanded by the prosecutor--he was accused of directing the massacres of more than 7,000 Muslim men in the enclave of Srebrenica in 1995. The judge presiding over his case pronounced him "evil" incarnate. Krstic, who sat through most of his trial, having lost his right leg to a mine explosion, swallowed hard at the verdict, looking drawn and gray. His conviction is obviously important. But perhaps more significant was the reaction to it among Bosnian Serbs. There was none.

The lesson in that is plain. When apprehended by British troops in December 1998, there were riots and reprisals. NATO has since feared that arresting his superiors, Karadzic and Mladic, would trigger more dangerous confrontations, possibly endangering its own troops. Now it appears there is little cause for concern. "There might be ...