Madam War Criminal

In 2001, Biljana Plavšić made history: she became the only female political leader ever prosecuted for mass atrocities. She was the one woman among 161 indictees at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia—and the first since Nuremberg to be convicted by an international court.

Charged with genocide and crimes against humanity, Plavšić took a plea bargain. Just one other Bosnian Serb politician at her level was sentenced: Radovan Karadžić himself, President to Plavšić’s Vice-President in the autonomous Republika Srpska. Yet before the conflict, Plavšić had been a globally renowned scientist at the University of Sarajevo, penning journal articles and serving as faculty dean.

This gripping book revolves around hundreds of hours of interviews with a stridently unrepentant war criminal—now in her 90s, and a free woman. How did this biology professor end up heading a vengeful ethno-nationalist movement that murdered tens of thousands?