Bosnia Wartime Commander Charged with Extortion

The Hague-based court acquitted him of all charges last July and Oric is regarded as a hero by many Muslims.

The Sarajevo prosecutor's office charged the Bosnian Muslim wartime commander Naser Oric with extortion and illegal possession of weapons and explosive devices, local media reported on Friday.

Oric was arrested in October, three months after a U.N. war crimes tribunal overturned his conviction for failing to stop the murder of Bosnian Serbs more than a decade ago.

"According to the indictment Oric is charged with extorting 240,000 Bosnian marka ($157,000) and possession of weapons and banned ammunition," FENA news agency quoted Prosecutor Branko Sljivar as saying.

Oric, who organised the defence of the eastern enclave of Srebrenica during the 1992-95 war, was originally convicted in 2006 by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for war crimes against Bosnian Serbs.

The Hague-based court acquitted him of all charges last July and Oric is regarded as a hero by many Muslims for leading the defence of Srebrenica which was later overrun by Bosnian Serbs who killed 8,000 Muslims.

However, the overturned conviction also angered many Bosnian Serbs who see the tribunal as biased against them and say that more than 3,000 of their own people had earlier been killed by forces under Oric's command.