The Hague Tribunal’s Chief Prosecutor Carla del Ponte is arriving today in Belgrade. Her visit is aimed to make the Serbian authorities extradite about a dozen of persons suspected of committing war crimes. Among them are Serbia’s incumbent President and Yugoslavia’s former internal affairs minister Milan Milutinovic, and also three former and incumbent army commanders – they are accused of the “mass murder” of Croats in Vukovara hospital in 1991.
It is very likely that the Serbian authorities will somehow meet Carla del Ponte’s demands for the sake of “further cooperation” with the tribunal. Otherwise, the country will again face isolation. Serbia’s Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic said last week that he would assist the process of “war criminal” handover. The fact that there has been no law adopted on how to proceed with the Hague Tribunal does not really matter – the Milisevic precedent has already been set.
The only thing that seems to be capable of creating a serious problem here is a possible handover of Mr. Milutinovic – the point is that he, as the incumbent president, is immune. Mr. Djindjic has already stated that Mr. Milutinovic may not be handed over on those grounds. Hague Tribunal’s envoy Florence Artman, in turn, insists that when it comes to a “war crimes tribunal” there should be no immunity for whoever it is – neither for frontline-forces Colonel Veselin Slivancanic nor even for Serbia’s incumbent president. Mr. Djindjic is not reluctant to conduct negotiations with Carla del Ponte on the issue – he is known to be able to strike deals with the West.
The chief prosecutor is also planning to meet with Serbia’s Justice Minister Vladan Batic who, too, has recognized Carla del Ponte’s right to “demand the suspects’ handover,” adding, however, that the Serbian government has the right “not to meet those demands.”
Talks with the federal authorities are not mentioned in this context – they really seem unnecessary, as it were.
Yugoslavia’s President Vojislav Kostunica may keep on reiterating that “war criminals from among Serbs should be tried in their homeland,” that he “considers the war crimes tribunal to be an instrument pointed against Serbs,” that “a law of cooperation with the Hague Tribunal should be adopted first,” etc.
Time has shown that Mr. Kostunica is not quite in control of the country’s affairs, and the Yugoslav government, parliament, and other federal bodies are just pro forma entities – real levers of influence are now concentrated in the republics. The expected restructuring of the Yugoslav Federation entails further buildup of the individual republics’ powers and the respective weakening of the central power.
The Serbian Radical Party headed by Vojislav Sesel is reported to have accused the Belgrade authorities of planning to detain and hand all the suspects, including Mr. Milutinovic, over to the Netherlandsand, and called on the people to take to the streets as sign of protest. Slobodan Milosevic’s Socialist Party of Serbia also is planning a rally in connection with Carla del Ponte’s visit.
The question is, however: to what extent are the people determined to respond to those “voices from the past?”
With Slobodan Milosevic’s extradition and the subsequent conference of donor countries, a new, “democratic” era began in the history of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The country’s population is now hoping to enjoy, at last, the benefits of the “Western democracy.” But this increasingly appears to be the matter of give and take.
SERGEI STEPHANOV
PRAVDA.Ru
http://english.pravda.ru/yougoslavia/2001/09/03/14116.html
