At the end of their closing argument on Thursday, lawyers for General Slobodan Praljak, a war-time commander of the Bosnian Croat Defence Council (HVO), asked the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) to acquit him of war crimes charges.
Praljak himself will address the court on Monday.
Leaders of the former self-styled Croat Community of Herceg Bosna - Prime Minister Jadranko Prlic, Defence Minister Bruno Stojic, HVO generals Praljak and Milivoj Petkovic, the commander of the HVO military police, Valentin Coric, and the head of the commission for the exchange of prisoners of war, Berislav Pusic - are accused of a joint criminal enterprise against Bosnian Muslims (Bosniaks) and other non-Croats in areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina which they wanted to annex to Croatia.
The prosecutors claim that the first Croatian president, Franjo Tudjman, and other war-time Croatian officials were at the helm of that joint criminal enterprise.
Praljak's defence team today dismissed claims about Croatia's interference into an international armed conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina, its territorial claims, as well as claims about the joint criminal enterprise.
Praljak's lawyers said that Croatia's involvement should be reduced to the fact that both Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina were exposed to military aggression and had to defend themselves.
Croatia was a necessary participant in the war as Croatia's security was undermined with the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, lawyer Bozo Kovacic told the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague.
Recalling that the Yugoslav People's Army had at the same time attacked territories of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, the lawyer said that Croatia had been the victim of a war which it did not want.
According to him, Croatia had a legitimate interest in taking steps for the defence of Bosnia and Herzegovina, thus defending its own territory directly threatened by the war on Bosnia's soil.
The lawyer said that Franjo Tudjman and the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) had encouraged Croats to vote for Bosnia's independence at a referendum on its sovereignty.
Tudjman turned down a territorial offer made by Bosnian Muslim leader and Bosnian president Alija Izetbegovic, according to the lawyer.
Kovacic said that Croatia had endorsed all peace initiatives aimed at preserving Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Praljak was not for the division of Bosnia and Herzegovina but for the defence of Croats in that country, his lawyers said, dismissing claims by the prosecution that he had been Croatia's agent in Bosnia.
