Following the pronouncement of the final verdict for former Serbian security officials Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic before the UN court for war crimes Bosnia and Croatia, an association of victims announced a lawsuit against Serbia but also against Bosnia's Serb-majority entity Republika Srpska.

“After the judgement for the joint criminal enterprise, and the verdict to Stanisic and Simatovic, we plan to file a lawsuit against the Republic of Serbia and RS. We will seek justice for every victims of genocide,” the ‘Mothers of Srebrenica’ association has briefly announced.

The announcement comes a two days after the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) sentenced Stanisic and Simatovic to 15 years in prison each, in the longest process before the UN court.

Ex UN court prosecutor Goldstone agrees war in Bosnia was international conflict

Mechanism Chief Prosecutor Serge Brammertz said following the verdict pronouncement that the final verdict proved what happened in Bosnia and Herzegovina was not a civil war but the international conflict.

The Presiding Judge noted that the pronouncement of this appeal judgement marked a milestone in the Mechanism’s mandate to continue the material, temporal, and personal jurisdiction of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), which closed in 2017.

This is the last appeal judgment involving core crimes from cases originating before the ICTY.