Serbia in the Yugoslav Wars from the FRY, as the Bosnian Serb faction alone could not pay for the costs. The Bosnian Serb Army was led by Ratko Mladić, an extremely controversial figure, who served the Yugoslav Army during the Croatian War of Independence 1991-1992, and has been accused of committing war crimes in Bosnia. Serbian Radical Party founder and paramilitary Vojislav Seselj publicly claimed Milošević personally asked him to send paramilitaries from Serbia into Bosnia and Herzegovina. After 1993, media reports of large-scale atrocities by the Bosnian Serb armed forces, such as the long siege of Sarajevo, resulted in increased pressure and sanctions by
Yugoslav People's Army withdrawal from Bosnia (1992) referendum was in favor of Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats, but of Bosnian Serbs, therefore the Bosnian Serbs boycotted the referendum. The turnout was 64.3% of which 99.7% of the votes were in favor of the Bosnian independence, thus on March 3 1992 the Chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina Alija Izetbegovic declared the independence of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Yugoslav People's Army had a concept of "Total National Defence", which gave the army a role to defend the borders from aggressors. According to some sources, the higher officials of the Yugoslav People's Army stated