BELGRADE, Serbia -- Serbia's Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a 13-year prison sentence for a former ethnic Albanian fighter convicted of taking part in the torture and rape of civilians at the end of the 1998-99 war in Kosovo province.

The defense appealed for Anton Lekaj, 26, to be sent back to Kosovo -- a United Nations and NATO protectorate since 1999. But the court confirmed an earlier verdict that found him guilty of war crimes.