According to British historian Marko Attila Hoare, the name of convicted war criminal Biljana Plavsic was among the signatories of a letter in support of a call for the UK to stop arming Ukraine by the University and College Union (UCU). Her name was later removed, he alleges.

Attila Hoare writes in his blog that the principal trade union for academic staff in the UK, passed a motion at its congress on 27 May calling for the British government to stop arming Ukraine.

“The resolution also committed the UCU to supporting the pro-Putin group ‘Stop the War’, which supports Russia’s annexation of Crimea and blames the war on the West rather than on Russia”, he writes, adding that the resolution was “naturally met by widespread outrage among UCU members and others, prompting supporters of the resolution to publish a letter in support of it.”

“Among its listed signatories were Alex Callinicos of the Socialist Workers Party, and Biljana Plavsic, vice-president of ‘Republika Srpska’ during the 1990s Bosnian war and convicted war-criminal”, he writes, providing a screenshot:

“After Callinicos shared the open letter on Twitter and it was pointed out to him that a convicted war-criminal was listed among its signatories, her name was removed. It is unclear whether the letter was signed by the real Biljana Plavsic or by someone seeking to embarrass the supporters of the UCU’s resolution. Either way, that her name should have been included says a lot about the sort of politics these people represent”, he added.

The former Bosnian Serb politician who served as President of BiH’s Republika Srpska (RS) entity was convicted of crimes against humanity for her role in the Bosnian War by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and sentenced to 11 years in prison. She was released in 2009, after serving two-thirds of her sentence.