SIX SREBRENICA MASSACRE SUSPECTS PLEAD NOT GUILTY

Six Bosnian Serbs plead not guilty over Srebrenica

Six former Bosnian Serb officers pleaded not guilty on Tuesday at the U.N. war crimes tribunal to charges of genocide over the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys.

The men have already appeared individually before the court but last year their indictments on charges of genocide or complicity in genocide, crimes against humanity and violations of the laws or customs of war were combined in a single indictment. Presiding judge Carmel Agius said in court he plans to start the combined trial in August.

The six men -- Vinko Pandurevic, Ljubisa Beara, Vujadin Popovic, Drago Nikolic, Milorad Trbic and Ljubomir Borovcanin -- all surrendered to the tribunal. Zdravko Tolimir, however, is still on the run.

Tolimir was one of several aides to wartime Bosnian Serb army chief Ratko Mladic, who is also still at large and one of the tribunal's most wanted men.

Mladic is also indicted over the Srebrenica massacre, the worst mass killing in Europe since world War Two, and the 43-month siege of Sarajevo in which more than 15,000 people died.

The Hague tribunal's chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte insists Mladic is sheltered by hardline army officers in Serbia, which Belgrade denies.

Two other Mladic aides are also named in the indictment but they are not charged with genocide.

Radivoje Miletic and Milan Gvero, who are currently on provisional release, are charged with crimes against humanity and violations of the laws or customs of wars including murder, persecution, forcible transfer and deportation.