Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) has condemned as 'a disastrous mistake' the EU Foreign Ministers' decision yesterday to approve a closer relationship for Serbia with the EU. "What this means is that they have chosen to turn their back on the legacy of the 1945-49 Nuremburg Trials and scorn the spirit of the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide", argued STP International's President Tilman Zülch, speaking in Göttingen on Tuesday. "Because it is only thanks to Serbia's assistance that the principal Serb war criminal Ratko Mladic, despite an international arrest warrant in his name, has been able to continue avoiding his rightful punishment for the genocide perpetrated at Srebrenica and elsewhere in Bosnia."

"It is disheartening to learn that Serge Brammertz of all people, the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), has certified Serbia's good co-operation and so has significantly contributed to this decision by the EU Foreign Ministers", Zülch observed. "Brammertz knows very well that Serbian President Boris Tadic is continuing to obstruct the hand-over of Ratko Mladic, a major war criminal intent on escaping justice."

From 2003 to 2004 as Minister for Defence Tadic tolerated Mladic's presence inside Serbian Army barracks. Up until 2002 Mladic was an official adviser to the Army Crisis Staff and as late as November 2005 the alleged war criminal was continuing to receive a regular pension.

STP will be writing personally to all parliamentary representatives in each of the 27 EU Member States, urging them to oppose ratification of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement with Serbia until such time as Ratko Mladic has finally been handed over to the International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague.

For further information contact Tilman Zülch via politik@gfbv.de