An officer who commanded special-police units in Sarajevo during the siege of the city by Bosnian Serb forces in 1992-95 has been charged with war crimes.
Prosecutors in Bosnia-Herzegovina indicted Dragan Vikic in connection with the execution of eight captured enemy combatants in 1992.
The prosecutor's office in the Balkan country said in a statement on December 29 that Vikic and three other former police officers were charged over their roles in the killings of the Bosnian Serb soldiers, who had been captured after their armored personnel carrier broke down on the outskirts of the city.
Vikic and one officer were charged with "failing to arrest, process, and sanction" people responsible for the crime and "failing to prevent removal of evidence and hiding of the bodies." Two other officers were charged with participation in the crime.
Vikic, whose forces fought to defend Sarajevo from Bosnian Serb attacks during the siege, dismissed any connection with the incident.
"My hands, and the hands of the people under my command, are clean," he told the Sarajevo website Klix.
Bosnian Serb forces supported by the Serb-dominated Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) held Sarajevo under siege from April 1992 until December 1995.
About 11,000 people died during the siege.
