Croatian War Crimes Suspect Caught
General Ante Gotovina, hunted by the Hague Inquisition over his
role in the 1995 blitzkrieg against the Krajina Serbs, was arrested in the Canary Islands (Spain) on
Wednesday evening.
Croatian authorities, who have steadfastly maintained
that Gotovina was not in Croatia, breathed a sigh of relief. But Gotovina's
arrest, for all the pleasure that it gives the Head Inquisitor Carla Del Ponte,
will have interesting political side-effects.
For years now, Washington
and Brussels have been using Gotovina as leverage against Zagreb, invoking
Croatia's "cooperation" with the Inquisition (or lack thereof) whenever they
wanted something. Now that Gotovina has been arrested, that leverage is gone.
As for Gotovina personally, he's got reason to hope. Just last week, the
Inquisition acquitted top KLA commanders of running a torture camp, and
sent them back to Kosovo for victory parades.
Their indictments were used as an example of ICTY's "fairness" and
"impartiality," aimed at Serbia, just as Gotovina's indictment was. Perhaps a
couple months from now, Gotovina will also be acquitted for lack of evidence, so
the Inquisition could get back to its appointed task of blaming everything in
the Balkans on the Serbs.
