Press Association
Sunday
July 4, 2004 9:48 PM
Slobodan Milosevic is expected to accuse Western governments of hypocrisy as
he opens his defence against war crimes charges, including genocide, at the UN
tribunal in The Hague. The 62-year-old former Yugoslav president's defence marks the half-way point
in a trial that legal experts consider the most important since Nazi leaders
faced justice after the Second World War. Milosevic's courtroom performance may also foreshadow what to expect from
former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. Milosevic has been given four hours to make his opening response to 66
charges of war crimes filed by prosecutors, including genocide, during the
break-up of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Prosecutors finished presenting their case against him in February after
introducing testimony from nearly 300 witnesses, reams of documents, videos and
other evidence in an attempt to link him to crimes in Croatia, Bosnia and
Kosovo. Milosevic has so far used his trial as an opportunity to grandstand for
supporters at home, a situation US and Iraqi authorities will be eager to avoid
at Saddam's trial. He has denied any wrongdoing, and is expected to challenge the authority of
the court. His strategy will likely include an attempt to turn the tables and
blame the UN member states that created the court, especially the United States
and its Nato allies, for alleged war crimes of their own. Despite his poor health, Milosevic has insisted on defending himself, greatly
slowing the pace of his trial, which began in February 2002. In his opening statement, Milosevic is expected to criticise former US
President Bill Clinton, Prime Minister Tony Blair and leaders of other Nato
countries. He has demanded that Clinton and 1,600 others, many of them prominent
politicians, appear to testify at his trial. But he will have just 150 days to
present his case, and the court has said he must give good reasons why any
witness should appear. © Copyright Press Association Ltd 2004, All Rights Reserved.
