Wartime Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic on Friday lodged an appeal against his 40-year jail sentence for genocide, accusing UN judges of "subjecting him to a political trial."

Karadzic, who appealed on 50 grounds before the UN's Yugoslav war crimes court, "was subjected to a political trial that was simply designed to confirm the demonisation of him and the Bosnian Serb people," his lawyer Peter Robinson said in a statement.