Serb minister renews vow to find Mladic

Mladic, 67, the former commander of the Bosnian Serb armed forces, has been on the run since being indicted by the ICTY in 1995.

Serb authorities would detain suspected war criminal Ratko Mladic if they knew where he was, Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic assured European parliamentarians on Thursday.

- We are in the process of searching every square millimetre of our national territory - to find Mladic and other Serb war criminals, Jeremic told the European parliament's foreign affairs committee in Brussels.

- If we knew where he was, he would not be at liberty, I can guarantee that - he assured.

Mladic, 67, the former commander of the Bosnian Serb armed forces, has been on the run since being indicted in 1995 by the UN's International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

He is accused of being behind the 44-month siege of Sarajevo that left 10,000 people dead and the July 1995 massacre of around 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica.

Jeremic's comments came as Serge Brammertz, the ICTY's chief prosecutor, visited Belgrade on a two-day to review Serbia's cooperation with the tribunal to find the fugitives.

Brammertz left Belgrade - satisfied with Serbia's cooperation with the ICTY and praised efficiency of all authorised institutions - Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic said in a statement released after his meeting with the prosecutor.

The prosecutor should submit a report to the UN Security Council next month to say if Serbia "fully cooperates with the court" on hunting the fugitives.

The ICTY has called for the arrest of Mladic and former Croatian Serb leader Hadzic, 51, who is wanted for the murder of hundreds of people and the deportation of tens of thousands of Croat and non-Serb civilians during the 1991-1995 Croatian war.

Another former fugitive, Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic, was arrested in July 2008 in Belgrade. The ICTY on Thursday delayed his genocide trial until March and imposed a lawyer on him due to his boycott of the proceedings.

Mladic remains at the head of the wanted list, and his arrest would certainly help Serbia's ambition of moving towards the European Union.

The Netherlands refuses to agree on a key EU-Serbia rapprochement accord while Mladic remains at large.

The agreement requires unanimous support from the 27 EU nations.