War crimes team in Bosnia

The United Nations chief war crimes prosecutor, Carla del Ponte, says she is disappointed with slow pace of cooperation from the Bosnian Serb authorities.

She was speaking after talks with the new Bosnian Serb authorities in Banja Luka.

Mrs del Ponte has been pressing for the handing over of the two main wartime leaders, Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic.

Both men have been indicted for serious war crimes, but the Bosnian Serb republic is only now amending its constitution to allow the extradition of indictees.

A BBC correspondent in Sarajevo says the issue of war crimes is still controversial, with many Bosnian Serbs seeing the Hague tribunal as a politicised institution. In the past three months, two war crimes suspects have, however, handed themselves in voluntarily.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service