Last Balkan War Crimes Suspect Arrested

The last fugitive wanted by the UN Balkan war crimes tribunal has been arrested by Serbian authorities after evading capture for seven years.

Goran Hadzic was being hunted over alleged atrocities committed during the 1991-1995 ethnic conflict for control of Croatia.

The arrest of the 53-year-old rebel Serb leader was the final demand from the court in The Hague which has indicted 161 leaders from the former Yugoslavia since it was created in 1993.

Hadzic had been on the run since the Hague tribunal indicted him in 2004 on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

His detention could boost Serbian hopes of becoming a candidate later this year for eventual entry to the 27-nation European Union.

And his arrest comes just two months after the capture of the world's most wanted war criminal Ratko Mladic who was wanted over the massacre of some 8,000 Bosnian Muslims in 1995.

The EU immediately welcomed Hadzic's arrest, saluting "the determination and commitment" of Serbia's government.

"It was our moral duty," Serbian president Boris Tadic said.

"We have done this for the sake of citizens of Serbia, we have done this for the sake of the victims amongst other nations, we have done this for the sake of reconciliation."

He added: "We have done this for the sake of establishing credibility of all societies, not only Serbian society.

"With this, Serbia, has concluded its most difficult chapter in the cooperation with the Hague Tribunal," Mr Tadic went on. "(It has met its) legal duties ... as well as its moral duty" to track down and arrest all war crimes fugitives."

Foreign Secretary William Hague said: "I am delighted by the news that Goran Hadzic has finally been arrested. This is an historic moment for international justice and for the victims of war crimes during the Balkan wars of the 1990s.

"I hope that his arrest will mark the closing of a horrific and traumatic chapter for the people of the region. We look forward to Goran Hadzic's swift transfer to The Hague so that the charges against him can be heard in an international criminal court."

Hadzic was arrested in the mountainous Fruska Gora region of northern Serbia where his family lives and where he fled to from Croatia after the war.

Mr Tadic denied that authorities knew where he had been hiding.

Shortly after his capture, Hadzic appeared at Serbia's war crimes court without his distinctive black beard and looking hunched.

He could be transferred to The Hague within the next few days.

Hadzic was indicted in 2004 and faces 14 counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes for the murders of hundreds of people and deportation of tens of thousands of Croats between 1992-1993.

More than 10,000 people died in the Croatian war, which ended when Croatia retook the territories held by the Serbs in 1995.