Infuriated Mladic removed from UN court

PanARMENIAN.Net - Former Bosnian Serb army chief Ratko Mladic was removed from the UN war crimes court at The Hague on Monday, July 4, after refusing to enter a plea and disrupting the judge's attempts to read out the charges against him.

The judge later entered formal pleas of not guilty on behalf of Mladic to the various charges against him, which include genocide, and relate to the 43-month siege of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo and the massacre of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica — Europe's worst massacre since World War Two.

Having threatened to boycott his second hearing since being tracked down, arrested and extradited from Serbia in May, Mladic did appear but spent several minutes demanding different legal representation and requesting a delay before having to plead.

"No, no, I'm not going to listen to this without my lawyer," Mladic shouted as he removed his translation headphones when judge Alphons Orie began reading out the charges. "Who are you? You're not allowing me to breathe."

Mladic, 69, was represented by a court-appointed lawyer.

The judge said the court would look into allowing him to be represented in future by other lawyers of his choice, Reuters reported.