They caught a small fish and convicted him of war crimes in the former Yugoslavia, but the brutal sharks are still swimming free. The conviction of torturer Dusan Tadic for crimes against humanity, the first by an international crimes tribunal since World War II, is welcome and justified but illustrates how weak the effort has been to capture the vicious masterminds of the war in Bosnia.
Tadic, a Bosnian Serb, was convicted on 11 of 31 counts of brutalizing Muslims at three Serb-run prison camps in 1992. The United Nations war crimes tribunal in the Netherlands concluded that evidence of murder against Tadic wasn't strong enough to justify convictions on those counts.
He could receive a life sentence, assuming appeals by both sides fail to succeed, but major criminals from all sides of the war remain free and are prospering. American soldiers and U.N. forces in the former Yugoslavia haven't pursued prominent persons such as former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic and military chief Gen. Ratko Mladic, saying their missions don't involve capturing accused war criminals.
Supposedly the newly elected leaders of the Serb and Croat sections of Bosnia are to hand over their own war criminals, but that hasn't happened and seems unlikely to. One promising way to pressure them was devised by two U.S. senators, who on May 7 introduced legislation to cut reconstruction aid to Bosnia unless accused war criminals are rounded up and face trial before the U.N. tribunal.
Democratic Sens. Dianne Feinstein of California and Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey make a convincing case that full reconciliation in Bosnia will be impossible unless war criminals are captured and tried. Congress ought to pass their bill to reduce the $5.1 billion in U.S. reconstruction aid as a practical method to push current leaders toward their inescapable responsibility.