WINNIPEG (CBC) - Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic intends to defend himself against UN war crimes charges, his lawyer said Wednesday.

Karadzic, 63, was arrested Monday after eluding officials for more than a decade and stands accused of masterminding Europe's worst massacre since the Second World War, the killing in 1995 of some 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica.

Details emerged Tuesday of Karadzic's 12 years spent hiding in Belgrade, during which he practised alternative medicine and wrote articles for a lifestyle magazine under a pseudonym while eluding police.

Karadzic is accused of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and other atrocities relating to the 1995 massacre and other acts against Muslim, Croat and other non-Serb civilians in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the 1992-95 war.

Karadzic's lawyer Sveta Vujacic said the former doctor and poet will have a legal team in Serbia to help him in his defence.

His decision follows former Yugloslavian president Slobodan Milosevic, who caused the consternation of court officials by defending himself in his five-year trial at the Hague. Milosevic died of a heart attack before a verdict was reached in the lengthy trial.

Karadzic is being held in Belgrade awaiting extradition to the UN war crimes prison in The Hague in The Netherlands, home to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

Prosecutors oppose defendants representing themselves in court because their cases are so complex.

Court spokeswoman Olga Karvan said prosecutors "believe the interests of justice will be best served if the accused are assisted by qualified counsel."

'I think it was about time'

Sanela Duponovic, a Bosnian War survivor who now lives in Calgary, told CBC News she was glad to hear Karadzic would finally face justice.

"I think it was about time that he pays for the crimes that he did," said Duponovic, whose father and other relatives disappeared during the conflict. Their bodies were never recovered.

"I hope he's going to suffer enough, like Bosnian people suffered during the war."

But Duponovic added it also "brought back bad memories" of being a 16-year-old when her father went missing in 1992.

"It would be nice if he was alive, but I don't think so," she said.

With files from the Associated Press

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