Anto Nobilo said Thursday's acquittal was a bigger surprise than the acquittal of former Yugoslav army chief of staff Momcilo Perisic.

"In Serbia Perisic is known to be a CIA collaborator so his acquittal was interpreted behind the scenes as a protection of the Americans. But the acquittal of these two is the biggest surprise, although every judge rules based on the evidence in the case file," he said.

"I don't know how the trial went, but from my general knowledge from that time, it was beyond doubt that the main lever of (former Yugoslav President Slobodan) Milosevic was the Serbian secret service and these two leaders through whom he instigated and led the Serb rebellion in Croatia. That was notorious in a way and whoever dealt with those problems believed that that was beyond doubt."

Nobilo recalled that the prosecution had asked for life imprisonment for Stanisic and Simatovic, which he said was not done when there was no evidence of very grave crimes.

He said the link between Serbian secret services and the war in Croatia was established already in 1991, when Zeljko Raznatovic aka Arkan was arrested.

"Arkan was the KOS (the counterintelligence service) connection and those were the channels through which everything was run. Later on, Frenki Simatovic took over all the paramilitary units, from the White Eagles to Arkan's Men and the Red Berets, and all were under his control for years."

Attorney Kresimir Krsnik said today's unexpected acquittal was proof that the ICTY was established for politics and not for justice.

"It's obvious that Serbia's guilt is being downplayed and that everything is being restricted to Bosnia and Herzegovina," he said.