Dragoljub Ojdanià(; 1 June 1941 â 6 September 2020) was a Serbian General of the army who served as the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Yugoslavia and Minister of Defence of Yugoslavia. Ojdaniàcommanded the Uzice corps during the Bosnian War and was tried and convicted of the deportation and forcible transfer of Kosovo Albanians during the Kosovo War by the ICTY.
In 1958, Ojdaniàstudied at the Yugoslav Military Academy and graduated in 1964. He was deputy commander of the 37th Corps, with command in Uà ¾ice. He was promoted to Major General on 20 April 1992 and he became the commander of Uà ¾ice korpus. Under his command, the Uà ¾ice Corps was deployed in military operations in eastern Bosnia during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
He served as Chief of the General Staff First Army of FRY in 1993 and 1994. From 1994 to 1996, he was commander of the First Army. In 1996 he became deputy commander Chief of the General Staff. In 1998 Slobodan Miloà ¡eviàplaced Ojdaniàas a Chief of the General Staff of the Yugoslav Army. He was also a Chief of General Staff during NATO's Operation Allied Force. In February 2000 after the death of defence minister Pavle BulatoviÃÂ, he was made defence minister of Yugoslavia.
On 25 April 2002, Ojdaniàwas transferred by the Yugoslav government to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. Ojdaniàwas allowed to attend Miloà ¡eviÃÂ's funeral in March 2006. On 26 February 2009, the ICTY sentenced Ojdaniàto 15 years in prison, following a conviction for deportation and forcible transfers of Kosovo Albanians.
On 27 May 2009, OjdaniÃÂ's case was appealed. OjdaniÃÂ's co-counsel on appeal was Peter Robinson of the United States. In January 2013, OjdaniÃÂ, publicly admitted his participation in war crimes against Kosovo Albanians and withdrew the appeal against his conviction. On 29 August 2013, OjdaniÃÂ was granted early release and afterwards lived in Serbia.