Robertson presses Serbs on Mladic

Robertson urged Mladic to give himself up

Nato Secretary-General George Robertson has said the Serbian Government has a duty to bring the former Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic to justice.

In his first visit to Belgrade since the 1999 Nato bombing, Lord Robertson said there were people in Serbia who knew General Mladic's whereabouts.

He also urged the war crimes suspect to give himself up to the authorities.

General Mladic has been indicted for ordering the massacre of 7,000 Muslims in Srebrenica during the Bosnian war.

The international community will never relax and will never stop looking for him until he is faced with a free trial Lord Robertson

But Lord Robertson said that his visit to Serbia and Montenegro was a clear signal it wanted to look forward, not back.

Reformers who ousted president Slobodan Milosevic in 2000 have been strengthening ties with the West.

Lord Robertson said the authorities should contact those people who were trying to protect General Mladic, who was likely to be still in Serbia.

Robertson: International community will not relax its efforts

"The duty and the obligation of the authorities is to find out from these people the location of that man, to find him and bring him to trial," he said after talks with Serbia and Montenegro Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic.

"Charges against Mladic are very serious and the international community will never relax and will never stop looking for him until he is faced with a free trial at the [tribunal]," he added.

He said that if General Mladic was a "true patriot" he would give himself up and face his accusers.

Belgrade has been under severe pressure to give up General Mladic, with the United States threatening to withdraw aid if Serbia fails to co-operate with the tribunal.