Only the weak and discredited commit war crimes.

While certainly these trials will provide some solace to the Karadzic's victims the whole trial process occurs only because of the fact that the perpetrators are on the losing side of a conflict and no longer have sufficient power to resist being tried. As with all trials of war crimes the victors are never tried for their war crimes. Churchill was never tried for the fire-bombing of Nuremberg, Truman for the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki nor NATO for war crimes in the bombing of Serbia even though a number of charges were brought forth. See this article. At the time the British defence minister pointed out that it was NATO members who provided funds for the court that was trying Milosevic and others. Of course the U.S. does not support an International Court of Justice only courts that do not try any U.S. soldiers! NATO not only bombed many crucial parts of Serbia's infrastructure such as power plants and water treatment plants it also bombed media outlets killing journalists. Of course it also by mistake bombed the Chinese embassy.
Art 79. Measures or protection for journalists1. Journalists engaged in dangerous professional missions in areas of armed conflict shall be considered as civilians within the meaning of Article 50, paragraph 1.
Article 85 - Repression of breaches of this Protocol3. In addition to the grave breaches defined in Article 11, the following acts shall be regarded as grave breaches of this Protocol, when committed wilfully, in violation of the relevant provisions of this Protocol, and causing death or serious injury to body or health:(a) making the civilian population or individual civilians the object of attack;(b) launching an indiscriminate attack affecting the civilian population or civilian objects in the knowledge that such attack will cause excessive loss of life, injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects, as defined in Article 57, paragraph 2 (a)(iii);

War crimes trials have less to do with justice and everything to do with the rule of the strong over the relatively weak and the power of victors over those who are vanquished. The good results of these trials are simply an unintended byproduct of this. If there were true justice Bush and others would be on trial as well. This is from the Globe and Mail.

Good news for international criminal justice
ERNA PARIS
From Wednesday's Globe and Mail
July 23, 2008 at 7:37 AM EDT
Slowly, steadily, the conviction that crimes against humanity and war crimes must be addressed -- no matter how long it takes, no matter how important the perpetrator - is gaining credence in world councils. Thirteen years after the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) first indicted Radovan Karadzic for his starring role in the genocide of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica and the medieval-style siege of Sarajevo, among other atrocities, the former Bosnian Serb leader has finally been detained.
His arrest - by Serb authorities, no less - sends a message that the historic expectation that leaders who commit crimes of this magnitude will remain immune from prosecution may be drawing to a close. International criminal justice is still a work in progress, but I believe we will look back on this stellar event as a significant signpost along the road to accountability.
The realization that Mr. Karadzic's impunity has dissolved will be especially important to Bosnian Muslims, many of whom barely managed to survive the former president's policies of murder, ethnic cleansing and rape camps as a means of achieving his political goals. There has been growing cynicism in this community about the failure of NATO and the U.S., in particular, to apprehend Mr. Karadzic and deliver him to the ICTY in The Hague. (The new international courts, including the ICTY, do not have their own police force and are dependent upon others to conduct arrests.) This capture, and the hint that his military commander Ratko Mladic's arrest will not lag far behind, will strengthen support for the tribunal among the victims, perhaps including backing for the idea that long-term peace and security may ultimately depend upon bringing war criminals to account under international law, thus breaking the cycles of revenge.
For years, the chances of bringing Mr. Karadzic to justice looked increasingly slim. He remained a hero to Bosnian Serb nationalists, which meant that he continued to have legions of supporters who identified with him and would protect him, if necessary. As a fugitive he was cocky in the extreme: He even published a book of poetry while allegedly on the run, and there were reports of regular sightings. In the end, only the government of Serbia was in a position to "find" him. But Serbia had been mostly unco-operative, to the frustration of a succession of ICTY prosecutors, including Canada's Louise Arbour, who understood better than anyone that the legacy of the court would depend, in large measure, on seeing this man in the dock.