ICTY prosecution seeks conviction or retrial in Seselj case

BELGRADE - The ICTY Office of the Prosecutor on Tuesday appealed a judgment acquitting Serbian Radical Party leader Vojislav Seselj of all charges of war crimes committed during the armed conflicts in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina and persecution of ethnic Croats from Serbia's Vojvodina province.

In a detailed appeal brief, the prosecution points to errors committed by the majority of the first-instance trial chamber that acquitted Seselj in late March and proposes that the Appeals Chamber find him guilty and convict him.

As an alternative, the prosecution proposes ordering a retrial.

"The Chamber erred in fact in finding that Seselj did not physically commit persecutions, as well as deportation and other inhumane acts (forcible transfer)," said the appeal brief.

The prosecution had sought 28 years in prison for Seselj.