"Scorpions" sentenced in Serbia

On April 10, four Serbian members of the Scorpions paramilitary were convicted by the War Crimes Chamber in Belgrade of executing six young Muslims in Trnovo, in south-eastern Bosnia, on July 17, 1995. Along with the trial for the massacre at Ovcara in Croatia [IJT-64], this trial, which opened in November 2005, was the most important one before the Serbian courts for crimes committed by Serbians in the early 1990s. Two of the accused were sentenced to 20 years in prison, another, who pled guilty, to 13 years, and a fourth to 5 years, reports AFP. A fifth defendant was acquitted. The video of the execution of the young Muslims, which was broadcast in June 2005, provoked shock among the Serbian public. According to Reuters, another member of the Scorpions identified on the video has already been sentenced to 15 years in prison by a Croatian court. For its part, the Serbian Supreme Court continues to overturn decisions rendered by trial courts against Serbian defendants. After ordering, in December, a new trial for the 14 Serbian paramilitary members sentenced for the massacre at Ovcara, the Supreme Court ordered the same thing, on April 10, for another paramilitary member accused of the same crime and sentenced to 20 years, reports AFP. However, on April 6, the same court upheld the 13-year sentence for war crimes of an Albanian fighter from the Kosovo Liberation Army, according to AP.