What’s the significance of a Karadžić verdict?
A refresher on the case against the wartime president of Republika Srpska.
|2019.03.19
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Indictments against Karadžić
Sounds a lot like genocide, doesn’t it? Well, the judges gave two reasons for saying no.
To find genocidal intent the judges did not ask “does it make sense?” but rather “is it the only reasonable inference that can be made?” This is an indication of how very high the threshold for a conviction on charges of genocide is.
Those decisions are artefacts of what a particular set of judges were prepared to do at a particular moment in social and political history, at a particular stage of the development of their profession.
The measure of success or failure of this verdict will not be in where Radovan Karadžić makes his residence between now and his death, or in what a gaggle of self-seeking politicians will do in the next week or month.
No verdict on any matter by any court is going to substitute for what a whole complex of institutions is failing to do about reconciliation.
Karadžić in the ’90s
Eric Gordy
Eric Gordy is professor of political and cultural sociology at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London.
DISCLAIMERThe views of the writer do not necessarily reflect the views of Kosovo 2.0.
This story was originally written in English.