US Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Saturday those hiding former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic were endangering Bosnia's future and demanded the authorities find and hand over the accused war criminal.
During a four-hour visit to the Bosnian capital, Powell told reporters there was no specific deadline to deliver Karadzic but it should have been done years ago.
He also stressed the US commitment to help the Balkan nation, which remains ethnically divided and relatively poor nine years after the end of the 1992-1995 war in which some 200,000 people died.
Powell said there had been some "encouraging signs" in the hunt for Karadzic and his military chief Ratko Mladic, both indicted for genocide by the UN tribunal in the Hague for the 43-month siege of Sarajevo and the 1995 massacre of up to 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica.
"I will not be happy till I see him and Mr. Mladic and others actually standing before the bar of justice in the Hague," Powell told reporters.
"I hope that those who may be harbouring these individuals realise that the future of their country is being held at risk by allowing these individuals to remain free.
"Criminals should not escape justice and unfortunately those harbouring these criminals make it more difficult for Bosnia to undertake the kind of reforms that it needs ... and keeps obstacles in the way of Bosnia's full integration into institutions," like NATO and the European Union.
"I hope they will be apprehended as soon as possible. It should have happened years ago," he added.
Powell's fleeting visit to Sarajevo, spliced into a week-long trip to the Middle East and Europe, also included talks with members of Bosnia's rotating three-man presidency that reflects its Muslim, Croat and Serb populations.
The US official made a point of thanking the Bosnian government for its commitment to send to Iraq troops specialising in handling unexploded ordnance and mines, an expertise that is a melancholy legacy of the Bosnian war.
Powell was also to meet SFOR Commander General Virgil Packett and Paddy Ashdown, the top international representative to Bosnia.