Serbian funeral as paean to fugitive By Nicholas Wood International Herald Tribune
MONDAY, MAY 9, 2005 NIKSIC, Serbia and Montenegro Jovanka Karadzic, an 83-year-old Montenegrin widow perhaps best known for giving birth to one of the world's most-wanted war crimes suspects, was laid to rest here this weekend with honors befitting a national heroine. For three days, hundreds of mourners filed past her coffin, laid wreaths and paid their last respects. She would, most here agreed, be remembered as one of the greatest women in Serbian history. Karadzic's achievement was, they said, being mother to her son Radovan, a psychiatrist and poet but probably better known as the wartime leader of the Bosnian Serbs and one of the most-wanted war crimes suspects sought by International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. It is almost 10 years since the Netherlands-based court indicted the former nationalist leader as the main advocate of ethnic cleansing during the Bosnian war, which began in 1992 and in which an estimated 150,000 people are said to have been killed. But in spite of repeated efforts to find him, led mainly by NATO troops in Bosnia, he has evaded capture. The funeral provided admirers of the onetime Bosnian Serb president - who still holds a near mythical status for some Serb nationalists - an opportunity to show their continuing support for him, as well a reminder to those who want to arrest him of his continuing elusiveness. Former soldiers, some sporting T-shirts bearing Karadzic's picture and emblazoned with the slogan "Serbian Hero," attended a packed service at Niksic's main cemetery. The two senior most members of Montenegro's Serbian Orthodox Church led the funeral, which was attended by mourners who had traveled from neighboring Bosnia and Serbia for the occasion. Amfilohije Radovic, the metropolitan of Montenegro, compared Mrs. Karadzic to mothers of legendary Serbian figures, calling her "the mother of an immortal," and recounted a conversation he said he had once had with her. "She once said, 'I would be a happy mother if they brought my son's dead body for me to kiss if I know he had died devoted to truth and his people. I would be an unhappy mother if they brought him to me alive and he had betrayed his people and his fate."' Officials at the war crimes tribunal in The Hague say a well-financed support network that includes police officers and members of the intelligence services in Bosnia, Serbia and Montenegro, as well as members of the Serbian Orthodox Church has enabled Karadzic to remain on the run. Substantial evidence of his whereabouts has been scarce. The tribunal's chief prosecutor said that at one stage Karadzic had been given refuge at a Serbian Orthodox Monastery, near Niksic, a claim the church denied. Bosnian newspapers also published claims that he had cut off his thick, gray locks and adopted a monk's habit. International pressure on Serbian and Bosnian Serb authorities to cooperate with the tribunal has borne fruit, diplomats in the region maintain, with the handing over of 12 Serbian war crimes suspects this year. In return both are likely to start negotiations on closer ties with the European Union. However, nearly all of those arrested were living openly in Bosnia or Serbia and were not in hiding for any length of time. Expectations for the arrests of the two most senior war crimes suspects, Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, the leader of the Bosnian Serb army during the Bosnian war, have increased as 10th anniversary of the end of the war approaches. Serbia's deputy prime minister, Miroljub Labus, said his government hoped that both would be arrested before the anniversary in July of the Srebrenica massacre, the worst atrocity of the war, during which at least 7,000 Muslim men and boys were killed by Serbian forces. "It is particularly scandalous that Karadzic and Mladic are at large now that we approach the Srebrenica commemoration," said Carla Del Ponte, in an interview on BBC radio in April. Unless both were arrested by then, she said, "I would say that nobody can be present at Srebrenica and show his face from the international partners." The Montenegrin police appeared to have ruled out the possibility that Karadzic might make an appearance at his mother's funeral. None of the police officers, at least none in uniform, were present. "He is here," said Zoran Stesevic, a former Bosnian Serb soldier attending the funeral. "In our hearts and minds," a friend, Jeca Vojvodic, quickly added and smiled. As the funeral broke up out, a lone voice wailed across the graveyard, "Long live Rada!" http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/05/08/news/serbs.php Serbian News Network - SNN [email protected] http://www.antic.org/
