Last Balkan war crime suspect doesn’t plead

THE HAGUE - The wartime leader of Croatia’s rebel Serbs declined to enter a plea yesterday in his first court appearance to face charges of murdering hundreds of Croats and expelling tens of thousands more in the final case to reach the UN’s Yugoslav war crimes tribunal.

Goran Hadzic, 52, was the last fugitive among 161 military and political leaders of the Balkans conflicts indicted by the court since it was created in 1993 while atrocities were still taking place in Yugoslav republics. His capture Wednesday in a northern Serbian village cleared the way for the court to close its doors when it concludes the current trials and appeals, probably in 2015.