Prison Changes Milosevic, but Not His Version of Events (NY Times login: fritopie, password: fritopie)
Almost ten years after the fall of Srebrenica, a reasonable person might have expected that the architects of this massacre would have long since been brought to justice. Clearly, we’re not dealing with anything a reasonable person might expect to encounter when the subject is the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the Hague. Almost ten years later, and Slobodan Milosevic still essentially has his world on a string. Outside of being deprived of his freedom, Milosevic still has not been called to account for the atrocities that occurred on his watch. Oh, he’s on trial for war crimes, of course, but his trial has become such a drawn-out farce that it has lost any significance in the search for justice.
The biggest problem is an international community more concerned with the rights of the accused than the memory of those he is ultimately responsible for killing. Not that I am advocating Milosevic’ summary execution (though this WAS the fate of too many Serb victims), but international justice is a virtual oxymoron.
To recent generations, names like Hitler, Stalin, Duvalier, and Pol Pot are little more than names in a history book. Their crimes are mere numbers, their victims faceless and nameless. They were smart, charismatic, and ultimately able to convince a country to follow them to glory. It would be nice to think that we have learned from recent history just how truly dangerous unchecked power can be. It would be nice…but it wouldn’t be close to being true.
Yes, Slobodan Milosevic is on trial for war crimes, but in a system so tilted toward protecting the rights of the accused, the likelihood of justice ever truly being served is remote. Somewhere, Georges Santayana is spinning in his grave….
THE HAGUE - Four years behind bars have inevitably changed Slobodan Milosevic. His white hair has receded, his stomach is bulkier, his English has improved. Since he arrived, handcuffed, at the United Nations jail in The Hague on June 28, 2001, he has also become less blustery, perhaps the result of blood-pressure medication or the sheer drudgery of his long trial on an array of war crimes charges.
Once given to bursting into tirades and dismissing his indictment as a fake and his trial as a farce, Mr. Milosevic, the former Serbian president, has now become steeped in the case’s 200,000 pages. These days, he sits in the dock flanked by carts full of binders, which he frequently consults. He addresses his three judges sitting high on the dais, rather than turning to the public gallery, which has been mostly empty.
But Mr. Milosevic’s old mind-set remains intact.
Day after day, he has tenaciously stuck to his own version of what happened during his 13 years in power, which led to three wars and killed more than 250,000. Serbs were not responsible for the wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo, he contends, but were forced to defend themselves from aggression.
I’ve always been fascinated by those who would rewrite history to their own advantage. Milosevic is a master at this “art”. Having seen some of his handiwork up close, though, I find it appalling that the international community has allowed his case to slip from the high profile it deserves. Milosevic masterminded a system that endeavored to carve out a homeland for Greater Serbia, where only Serbs would be welcome. That thousands would need to be displaced and/or killed in order to achieve this goal was merely a sad but necessary reality, and besides, why would Serbs lose sleep over the privations of non-Serbs?
Contrary to charges in his indictment, Mr. Milosevic says there was no plan to create a larger country for all Serbs and no atrocities were committed. Yes, people died, but they were fighting, or were bombed by NATO. This view of history has been much on display in the months since Mr. Milosevic began calling his own witnesses to defend not just himself, but also the Serbian national cause. The prosecution rested its case last year after bringing 114 witnesses to the court and presenting written testimony from 240 additional witnesses to buttress its lengthy charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.
The trial, which began in February 2002, has already set a record for longevity in international law and the end is not in sight.
So far, Mr. Milosevic, who acts as his own lawyer, has presented close to 30 witnesses, among them former aides, old Communist Party friends, historians and a forensic specialist, as well as outsiders including a French Army colonel and several senior Russian politicians. He has used almost 40 percent of the 150 days allotted to him, but his lawyers say he plans to call dozens more witnesses. “You can expect I will be asking for a prolongation,” Mr. Milosevic told the judges at a recent hearing. “My aim is to present the truth, and that takes time.”
More truthfully, the plan is to stall, delay, and obstruct. So far, with ICTY’s complicity, Milosevic has been able to do just that. Proceedings are moving at a glacial pace. Three years into the trial, there is still no way to predict when the end will be reached.
This is justice? Yes, I understand the need for Milosevic to be able to mount an effective defense, but where is the sense of urgency? Where is the desire for justice? Or have we reached the point where the international community has grown tired of the inconvenience presented by Milosevic’ trial and wishes that it and he would somply go away?
Milosevic was the architect of one of the most brutal, repressive, genocidal regimes of our time, and yet the international community is handling his trial as if he were accused of unpaid parking tickets. Before long, a name that should be discussed in concert with Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot will be little more than an afterthought…and the people in Srebrenica- indeed, throughout Bosnia and Croatia- will have died for nothing. Justice delayed is…well, justice denied.
If there is any justice in the world, Slobodan Milosevic would be facing a firing squad without a blindfold. So much for international law….
Too bad that outrage has a limited shelf life, eh?
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