The Hague: A UN war crimes court will hand down on March 24 its long-awaited verdict on Bosnian Serb ex-leader Radovan Karadzic facing 11 charges including genocide arising out of Balkans wars, the tribunal said on Thursday.
"The pronouncement of the judgement in this case (will) take place on Thursday 24 March 2016 at 2 pm in courtroom I," the presiding judge O-Gon Kwon said.
Karadzic's trial opened in October 2009 at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and he is still in detention in The Hague, awaiting the verdict after closing arguments wrapped up in October 2014.
Once one of Europe's most wanted men, Karadzic, 70, is accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity during the 1990s Bosnian war, as well as genocide for his alleged role in the Srebrenica massacre.
The president of the former self-proclaimed Bosnian Serb republic failed to plead at the start of his marathon trial so a "not guilty" plea was entered on his behalf.
Almost 8,000 Muslim men and boys were slaughtered and their bodies dumped in mass graves after Bosnian Serb forces overran the UN-protected enclave pf Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia in July 1995.
The slaughter is deemed one of the bloodiest crimes committed on European soil since World War II.
Despite claiming his innocence, Karadzic did apologise to victims of the crimes, accepting responsibility as the serving president of the territory at the time.
Prosecutors have said life behind bars "would be the only appropriate sentence".
Karadzic, along with late Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic and Bosnian Serb general Ratko Mladic, acted together to "cleanse" Bosnia's Muslims and Croats from Serb-claimed territories after the collapse of Yugoslavia in 1991, the prosecution has claimed.
Milosevic died mid-way through his own trial in March 2006 and Karadzic's military alter ego Mladic went on trial in May 2012.
Karadzic is also facing charges related to the sniping and shelling committed during the 44-month-long siege of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo, which ended in November 1995 by which time 10,000 people had been killed.
A verdict in the Mladic case is not expected until 2017.
