Serbian official hunting Mladic resigns

The head of a Serbian unit hunting war crimes accused Ratko Mladic resigned on Tuesday over his team's failure to arrest the suspect.

BELGRADE, December 29, 2009 (AFP) - The head of a Serbian unit hunting war crimes accused Ratko Mladic resigned on Tuesday over his team's failure to arrest the genocide suspect by the end of the year.

"This is to inform you that for reasons well known to everybody... I resign from my post" as chief of the unit, Rasim Ljajic said in the letter submitted to Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic

The unit was formed in 2006 and tasked with tracking down and arresting remaining war crimes fugitives wanted by the Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

But Ljajic's unit has failed to lay a finger on Mladic, the most wanted suspect stemming from his role in the 1992-95 war in Bosnia, particularly the 1995 massacre of some 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica.

Both Ljajic and war crimes prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic have repeatedly said they expected Mladic to be arrested by the end of the year.

Ljajic in September said he would resign unless he could deliver Mladic to the court by December 31.

However, he said he still had full confidence in his team "and their devotion to reach the goal," in the letter seen by AFP.

He said his team had "done our best" and had never made a "bigger or more serious effort" to locate Mladic.

Mladic and Croatian Serb wartime leader Goran Hadzic are the only remaining fugitives from the ICTY and are believed to be in hiding in Serbia.