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The Hague, Netherlands -- Croatian President Franjo Tudjman's "obsession" with annexing parts of Bosnia led to the massacre of hundreds of Muslims, a Yugoslav war crimes tribunal prosecutor said Monday.
Prosecutor Gregory Kehoe said Bosnian Croat forces acted as agents of Tudjman's regime as they swept through central Bosnia in 1992-'94 killing Muslim men, women and children and torching their homes and mosques.
Kehoe's accusations, made during closing arguments in the U.N. court's trial of Croat Gen. Tihomir Blaskic, are likely to further strain relations between the tribunal and Croat authorities that are already at the breaking point.
Chief Prosecutor Louise Arbour has threatened to report Croatia to the U.N. Security Council if it does not soon extradite two indicted suspects in Croat custody and hand over thousands of pages of evidence wanted by investigators.
Blaskic, 38, faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment if convicted of any one of 20 charges of crimes against humanity, war crimes and grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions. He has pleaded not guilty to all counts.
Prosecutors say he commanded troops responsible for the killings and persecution, including the massacre of more than 100 Muslim men, women and children in the village of Ahmici in April 1993.
Kehoe told the three-judge tribunal the purge was part of a political plan "developed in the halls of power in Zagreb, Croatia by President Franjo Tudjman and his political associates."
One witness cited Monday by Kehoe said annexing parts of Bosnia was "an obsession with Tudjman."
The campaign in central Bosnia was aimed at driving Muslims out of a self-proclaimed Bosnian Croat state, which would then be annexed by Croatia, Kehoe said. Ultimately, Croatia did not take over the territory.