Bosnian prosecutors issued an indictment against a former general of Bosnian Serb forces, Milenko Zivanovic, on Tuesday, accusing him of taking part in genocide against Bosniak civilians in Srebrenica in July 1995.

During the 1992-95 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Zivanović, now 75, served as commander of Bosnian Serb forces in eastern Bosnia. Prosecutors allege that he took part in a joint criminal enterprise to expel ethnic Bosniak locals from the area, which involved killing more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys from Bosniak-held enclaves of Srebrenica and Zepa following their fall to Bosnian Serb forces..

Units under Zivanovic’s command besieged the United Nations safe haven in Srebrenica in March 1995, and in the process prevented humanitarian supplies to be delivered to the civilian population sheltering in that town. According to the indictment, Zivanovic also ordered mortar attacks on civilian buildings in Srebrenica. Several civilians were killed in the shelling. After the town’s fall to Bosnian Serb forces, Zivanovic and his subordinates allegedly took part in separating Bosniak men and boys from their families prior to their executions.

Zivanovic was a defence witness in the trial against the top Bosnian Serb political leader, Radovan Karadzic, who was convicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and sentenced to life in prison on genocide charges, including the Srebrenica atrocities.