Bosnian war criminal poisons himself to death

A Bosnian Croat war criminal died on Wednesday after apparently drinking poison in dramatic courtroom scenes after UN judges upheld his 20-year jail term, Croatian media said, throwing the tribunal into chaos during its final judgement.

Slobodan Praljak, 72, died in hospital, according to Croatia’s state-run news agency HINA after he drank from a brown bottle at the hearing at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague. After the judges upheld a 20-year jail term originally imposed in 2013, Praljak, 72, a former military commander of a breakaway Bosnian Croat statelet, shouted out angrily: “Praljak is not a criminal. I reject your verdict.”