U.N. officials removed the leader of the ultranationalist Serbian Radical Party from court on Wednesday after he disrupted a hearing on how to proceed with his trial due to his refusal to cooperate with defense lawyers.

Vojislav Seselj, who faces charges of persecution, extermination, murder and torture of non-Serbs in wars in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, was banned from representing himself in August after disrupting pre-trial hearings.

The U.N. tribunal's appeals chamber restored Seselj's right to defend himself last month, but two lawyers -- David Cooper and Andreas O'Shea -- were assigned as standby counsel ready to take over his defense if Seselj disrupted the trial again.

"I demand that you remove these spies that are acting as my counsel from the courtroom," Seselj said, waving his fist in a hearing broadcast from The Hague on the tribunal's Web site. "You have to decide either to remove them or to remove me."

Seselj interrupted proceedings each time Cooper and O'Shea tried to speak and was eventually removed from court after several warnings from presiding Judge Alphons Orie.

After Seselj had gone, Cooper told the court that uncertainty about who was leading the defense placed him in a difficult position and had delayed preparations for starting the trial that had been due to get underway on Thursday.

"Dr Seselj will not be prepared to start his trial in the immediate future," he said.

Orie said he hoped a new hearing could be scheduled for Friday to hear from Seselj himself how much time he needed to prepare for the trial.

Supporters of Seselj, who surrendered to the Hague tribunal in 2003, have complained he has already had to wait too long for his trial and charged that the court is biased against Serbs.

Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, who also refused to cooperate with defense lawyers assigned by the court, died in detention in March just months before a verdict in his marathon trial on genocide charges.

The tribunal said the main reason Milosevic's trial was taking so long was because the court had allowed him to defend himself. Prosecutors said Milosevic wanted to string out the trial to stay in the spotlight.

Seselj's Radicals are Serbia's biggest party, with opinion polls giving them 35-38 percent support, although that would not be enough to allow them to govern alone.

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