UK 'helps Serbs to rewrite history'

Ejup Ganic, 64, who was arrested on March 1 as he tried to leave the UK, said he was "not happy" the Home Office had complied with a Serbian extradition request.

His lawyers say the request is politically motivated and designed to distract attention from the trial of former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic at The Hague.

Chief District Judge Timothy Workman at City of Westminster

Magistrates' Court adjourned the case for a management hearing on April 20, which Dr Ganic does not have to attend.

A full extradition hearing will be scheduled for a later date.

Speaking outside court after yesterday's hearing, Dr Ganic said: "Maybe it's time to remind you that I spent almost four years in the surrounded Sarajevo, the city that was under a siege never recorded in history before.

"Genocide happened in Bosnia. The Serbs committed a genocide. Imagine those people who were fighting for London when the Germans were bombing London, imagine Nazis now prosecuting those British who were trying to defend Great Britain against Nazi Germany."

He continued: "We didn't have good luck with this country at the beginning of the repression.

"They didn't stop the genocide. They haven't been as hard on Serbs as they should be."

The grounds for refusing a valid extradition request are extremely limited.

Dr Ganic, a friend of Baroness Thatcher, was arrested after visiting the UK for a degree ceremony at the University of Buckingham.

The university is partnered with the Sarajevo School of Science and Technology, where he is president.

Last year, a Belgrade court indicted Dr Ganic and 18 others over their alleged roles when 42 soldiers were killed at the start of the Bosnian war in May 1992. Dr Ganic, a senior minister, had assumed the role of acting president after then Bosnian president Alija Izetbegovic was taken hostage by Serb forces at Sarajevo airport.

He is accused of "personally ordering" an attack on a convoy of Yugoslav soldiers, who were accompanied by United Nations peacekeepers, as they retreated from a Bosnian Muslim area of the city.

Serbia says this violated a safe passage pact.

The hearing, also attended by Serbian war crimes prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic, heard Dr Ganic is accused by Serbia of grave breaches of the Geneva Convention and conspiracy to murder.

Ben Watson, on behalf of the Serbian government, said he was accused of "war crimes against the wounded and sick", "unlawful killing and wounding of the enemy" and "use of forbidden means of combat".

He said it is alleged that on May 2-3 Dr Ganic personally ordered attacks on a military hospital, an officers' club, a column of medical vehicles and a column of Yugoslav Army vehicles.

John Jones, defending, told the court the extradition request was "manifestly ill-founded" and politically motivated.

He said Serbia was "using the extradition process to wage war by other means", adding: "We say they know it is completely illegal."

He said: "We want a hearing on abuse as expeditiously as possible. Dr Ganic has already suffered a terrible ordeal emotionally and physically.

"He is a distinguished statesman and scholar. Needless to say he denies all these allegations."