Hague wants Milosevic

The Hague Tribunal wants Slobodan Milosevic, the ex-President of Yugoslavia, to be extradited for trial in the Netherlands first. Hague Tribunal spokesperson Jean-Jacques Joris stated that recent reports that Chief Prosecutor Carla del Ponte had said she was willing to wait some months were wrong and that Yugoslav proceedings against Mr. Milosevic could continue while he was being tried in the Hague. The message is clear – that the Hague Tribunal and its political paymasters regard Yugoslav criminal law and the country’s institutions with scorn. To state that the case against Mr. Milosevic must be launched in the Hague first and in Yugoslavia second is tantamount to an insult. Hague Tribunal officials indeed arrived in Belgrade yesterday and delivered a warrant for the indictment of Slobodan Milosevic “without undue delay”. Registrar Jim Landale, the leader of the team, issued the following statement: “Milosevic is now in their custody, he is under their control, so they will be obliged to present the warrant to him with due diligence, without undue delay”. The response from Belgrade was swift. The Serbian Justice Minister, Vladan Batic, handed over a letter to the officials from the Hague Tribunal which demanded that charges are brought against leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army for atrocities committed in that province since 1998. He stated that the letter is addressed to Carla del Ponte and requests the urgent indictment of Hashim Thaqi and other ex-KLA leaders which is “still acting ruthlessly in Kosovo and committing brutal crimes”. Given the present scenario, this legitimate claim is likely to fall on deaf ears. Robin Cook announced yesterday in Skopje that the Albanians in Macedonia have “legitimate aspirations” which the government must address and the US Congress calls for the Serbs to release Albanian terrorists arrested by the police, otherwise economic aid will not be forthcoming. It is known that the US Congress has invited, wined and dined with known Albanian terrorists in the USA. It is therefore obvious that the whole issue around this Hague farce is about far more than Slobodan Milosevic. It is an attempt to destabilise Europe (who better to do this than the Albanians, whose own country sporadically disintegrates into chaos, showing a total absence of a State) on the doorstep of the EU. At the same time, it is an affront to the Slavic nations of Eastern Europe and a not so covert attempt to humiliate Russia. The policy here is “dividire et impera”. Maybe the Yugoslav authorities will take a leaf out of Fidel Castro’s book. When ordered by the USA to allow his political prisoners to go free, he emptied his prisons and psychiatric hospitals and sent them all to Florida. Only when there is a large concentration of Albanians in the USA will this country see the enormity of its mistake in foreign policy.

TIMOTHY BANCROFT-HINCHEY PRAVDA.RU LISBON