This three-picture combination shows (from left) Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic in an April 1996 file photo during the Bosnian Serb assembly session in Pale, some 16 kilometres (10 miles) east of Sarajevo; Karadzic in an undated photo released by Belgrade's 'Healthy Life' magazine Tuesday, July 22, made at an undisclosed location in Belgrade with glasses, long white hair and a beard; Karadzic appearing in the courtroom during his initial appearance at the United Nation's Yugoslav war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, yesterday. - AP

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP):

Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic appeared at the United Nation's (UN) Yugoslav war crimes tribunal for the first time yesterday, telling the judge he would defend himself against charges of genocide and crimes against humanity.

Karadzic, 63, appeared older and thinner than during the Bosnian war and was shorn of the long, white hair and bushy beard that long disguised him.

But he had lost little of the brash defiance he repeatedly flashed in meetings with diplomats and international envoys when he was the untouchable ruler of Bosnian Serbs' ministate during the 1992-95 war.

Arrest illegal kidnapping

Karadzic claimed his arrest in Belgrade last week was an illegal kidnapping and refused to enter pleas to his 11 charges, which include genocide and crimes against humanity.

He smiled when Judge Alphons Orie asked him about the conditions of his detention in a UN cell near the court. ''I've been in worse places,'' he said.

And when Orie asked if his family knew where he was being held, Karadzic replied: ''I do not believe there is anyone who does not know that I am in the detention unit.''

Karadzic claimed he cut a deal in 1996 with a United States negotiator to drop out of public life, apparently in return for his indictment being scrapped.