One of the most wanted war crimes suspects in the former Yugoslavia is living in Serbia with the government's knowledge, a Serbian politician has alleged.

Serb authorities were "playing dumb" when they pretended not to know where the former Bosnian Serb military leader Ratko Mladic was, alleged Nenad Canak.

"He is here and is appearing in seven locations," Mr Canak, the parliamentary speaker of the northern Serbian province of Vojvodina, said in a television interview.

The war crimes tribunal at The Hague has repeatedly insisted that Mr Mladic is hiding in Serbia.

The tribunal is calling for the general's arrest

The court's chief prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, on a tour of the Balkans in October, accused the Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica, of obstructing the arrest of the general.

Several charges have been made against the Bosnian Serb commander by the tribunal including that of genocide.

The charges are related to the massacre of 7,000 Muslim boys and men at Srebrenica in 1995.

But the Serbian authorities say the military leader who led the Bosnian Serbs during the 1992-95 war has left the country and they do not know his whereabouts.

But Mr Canak said "the relevant institutions are only playing dumb when they say that Mladic is not in Serbia".

The United Nations Security Council has set a deadline of 2008 for the war crimes court to wrap up its work.

But this will be extended until the top fugitives, including Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic and Mr Mladic, have been tried.