ICJ to examine Croatia's genocide claim against Serbia

THE HAGUE - The International Court of Justice will examine the admissibility of Croatia's 1999 genocide claim against Serbia in hearings set for May 26 to 30, the court said Thursday.

The hearings will be mostly procedural dealing only with objections raised by Serbia against the claim.

Serbia says the court has no jurisdiction because Belgrade was not party to the Genocide Convention on the date the complaint was filed.

In 1999, Zagreb filed a lawsuit with the ICJ, the UN's highest court, against Belgrade saying it violated its obligations under the 1948 Genocide Convention because it controlled armed forces that carried out ethnic cleansing during the 1992-95 war in Croatia.

Croatia said the atrocities were "a form of genocide".

In a similar case brought against Serbia before the ICJ by Bosnia, the court ruled in February 2007 that Belgrade did not commit genocide in Bosnia.

However, the judges said Serbia should be punished for failing to stop Bosnian Serbs from committing genocide in Srebrenica in 1995.

sb/mjs

04/10/2008 14:43 GMT