Herzegovina, December 02, SPA -- NATO troops searched Radovan Karadzic's family home Tuesday for evidence of contacts to the network that has helped genocide suspect Ratko Mladic evade arrest. NATO spokesman Derek Chappell said family members were questioned at their home in Pale, near Sarajevo. Soldiers were seen carrying out suitcases and boxes from the house. Karadzic's wife and daughter were among those at home. Former Bosnian Serb leader Karadzic has been in the custody of the U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague since July, according to a report of Associated Press. «Even though Radovan Karadzic is at The Hague awaiting trial, we believe there are connections between the organized support networks of Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic,» Chappell said. «The purpose of (the) operation is to search for information, evidence about this connection,» he said, adding that the investigators were «pleased with the result.» The Karadzic house was frequently raided over the course of a decade while the former Bosnian Serb leader was on the run. It was believed that a support network that included his family financed and facilitated his years of hiding. He was finally arrested in Belgrade, where he lived under a false identity and practiced alternative medicine. Karadzic and his former general Mladic are accused of having masterminded the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica and the armed siege of Sarajevo during the 1992-95 war. The U.N. tribunal believes Mladic is hiding in neighboring Serbia. Mladic and Croatian Serb wartime leader Goran Hadzic are the last two fugitives sought by the court based in The Hague, Netherlands.
