AFP - The UN war crimes tribunal on Thursday appointed a London lawyer to represent Radovan Karadzic during his genocide trial, a legal adviser to the Bosnian Serb wartime leader said.

"The clerk informed us today that it had designated Richard Harvey," the adviser, Marko Sladojevic, told AFP in The Hague, where the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) sits.

Two weeks ago the ICTY ordered that a lawyer be appointed for Karadzic after he failed to attend the start of his trial last month. He argued that he had not been given enough time to prepare his own defence.

Proceedings have been adjourned until March 1 in the case, in which Karadzic stands accused of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity -- notably in connection with the Srebrenica massacre in July 1995 and the siege of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo.

Sladojevic said that despite Harvey's nomination, "Mr Karadzic is not going to cooperate with the lawyer designated by the clerk... He still demands the list of all lawyers registered with the ICTY in order to chose one himself."

In a legal career dating back to 1971, Harvey has dealt with a number of domestic and international criminal and human rights cases -- including two before the ICTY in which he defended Kosovo Albanians accused of war crimes, according to a biography on the website of his practice Garden Court Chambers.