Milan Babic dies in The Hague

Gilps · March 6, 2006

Ex-Milosevic ally 'kills himself'

Former Croatian Serb leader Milan Babic has committed suicide in his prison cell in The Hague, the UN war crimes tribunal said on Monday.

Babic was serving a 13-year prison term for crimes against humanity, after admitting persecuting the non-Serb population in Croatia's Krajina region.

UN prosecutors regarded him as one of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's key allies.

He was found dead on Sunday evening, the tribunal said in a statement.

"The Dutch authorities were called immediately. After conducting an investigation, they confirmed that the cause of death was suicide," the statement said.

Babic was prime minister of the self-declared breakaway Krajina Serb republic after Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia in 1991.

He was jailed in 2004 for crimes committed during Croatia's 1991-1995 war.

In 2005, Babic was transferred to serve his sentence abroad, but he was brought back to The Hague last month to testify in the trial of Milan Martic, another Croatian Serb.

Paul B · March 6, 2006