A breakthrough meeting with Bosnian Serb army commanders has left international war crimes investigators hopeful that they may finally arrest their key suspect, former Bosnian Serb president Radovan Karadzic.
Investigators from the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal, based in The Hague, are in buoyant mood after last weekend's meeting when seven Serb army chiefs promised co-operation after years of obstruction.
Prosecutors hope now to get information on the whereabouts of Karadzic, who is blamed for masterminding a campaign of ethnic cleansing in which 100,000 were killed and nearly two million made homeless.
"We're waiting to see whether the words we have heard translate into effective action," said the tribunal spokesman, Mr Paul Risley. "For the Serb Republic to be treated as a full entity they must co-operate fully."
Karadzic, accused of crimes including genocide, has been a fugitive for two years, and is thought to be hiding in the mountains and forests of eastern Bosnia.
His arrest would remove a key political obstacle to the reintegration of Bosnia, where hatred between Croats, Muslims and Serbs remains high, and would also end NATO's embarrassment.
After the Dayton peace plan was signed in 1995, Karadzic lived openly and in comfort in a villa in the mountain village of Pale, just 30 minutes' drive from NATO's Sarajevo headquarters.
NATO commanders, fearing a Serb backlash, ordered their troops to stay out of his way. By the time the policy changed, he had fled.
One immediate result of the meeting was that the commanders told prosecutors there would be no resistance if they wanted to arrest former general Stanislav Galic, who lived in the Serb capital, Banja Luka. Two days later, last Monday, he was arrested by British commandos.
The meeting of the generals came after another first when the Serb Prime Minister, Mr Milorad Dodik, met the s chief prosecutor from The Hague, Ms Carla Del Ponte, on December 1st.
Mr Dodik probably knows where Karadzic is. Giving this information to NATO is a tradeoff. On the one hand, Mr Dodik will be seen as a traitor by nationalists. On the other, the Serb Republic is desperate for Western aid. Mr Risley said this aid would flow - providing the Serbs came up with leads.
"Whether they like us or don't like us, they acknowledge that the tribunal is not going to go away," said Mr Risley. "There are more important issues (for the Serbs), like finding a job and finding food."
Karadzic is reported in the Serb press to be putting out feelers to the tribunal for a reduction of sentence if he gives himself up - a tactic he tried without success through an American lawyer in 1997. Western officials expect the effort to be rebuffed.
"We're talking about people accused of mass murder and genocide. How can you plea-bargain over crimes against humanity?" asked one source.
Also high on the wanted list is the former Bosnian Serb army commander, Ratko Mladic, accused of ordering the worst atrocity of the war - the massacre of 7,000 unarmed Muslim civilians in the town of Srebrenica in 1995.
But he is likely to stay free: NATO sources say he is in Yugoslavia, hiding with the Yugoslav army of which he remains a member.
"The fact that Karadzic and Mladic are running free stymies any long-term peace and stability in the region - they absolutely have to be brought to justice," said Mr Duncan Bullivant, former press officer for the International High Representative in Bosnia.