THE HAGUE, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - Appeal judges on the UN's Yugoslav war crimes court on Wednesday confirmed a 35-year sentence for former Croatian Serb leader Milan Martic for crimes against Croat and other non-Serb civilians.

'This chamber affirms the term of imprisonment,' said presiding judge Fausto Pokar of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, in The Hague.

Martic, 53, a one-time close ally of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, held various posts, including president, in Krajina -- a region in the northeast of Croatia that unilaterally declared itself a Serb republic in 1991.

He was found guilty by the tribunal in June last year of 16 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity.