Milosevic buried in his hometown
Milosevic buried at family home
Thousands of mourners bid farewell to Milosevic
Demise of Milosevic is a death blow to Hague court: Western justice has a lot of explaining to do
Prosecutor: Int’l Court Should Be Faster
POZAREVAC, Serbia-Montenegro (AP) - Slobodan Milosevic was laid to rest Saturday beneath a tree at the family estate in his hometown, a quiet end for a man blamed for ethnic wars that killed 250,000 people in one of the turbulent Balkans’ bloodiest chapters.
It would be easy to say “good riddance” to former Yugoslav President and “Butcher of the Balkans” Slobodan Milosevic…and that’s why I am saying exactly that. Yes, I understand the need for a certain segment of the Serb population to say goodbye to their “hero” and patron saint. What greatly disturbs me, though, is the willingness of so many Serbs to look past the reality of Slobodan Milosevic and his murderous, despotic reign and lionize him as some sort of national icon of courage and steadfastness.
To far too many Serbs, Milosevic represented the dream of Greater Serbia, the creation of a state where only Serbs would be allowed to live, thereby ensuring the safety and security of the Serbian people. The dream of “Greater Serbia” is a facade that was used to justify the murder and repression of untold thousands of former Yugoslav citizens in the name of Serbian racial and ethnic purity.
Samo sloga Srbina spasova.
Only where there are only Serbs will Serbs be safe.
The reality that too many of these paranoid, ignorant, and heavily propagandized could so blithely ignore is that their “hero” is responsible for the death of something like 250,000 of their former countrymen. Of course, Yugoslavia was always an artificial construct, Tito’s personal plaything that went to Hell quickly once he died. Serbs loved Yugoslavia, because they flourished under Tito’s iron hand. Though the ethnic tensions and hatreds we’re now all too familiar with were kept under lock and key during Tito’s reign, many Serbs still harbored the dream of Greater Serbia, and were willing to do virtually anything to realized the dream.
Compounding the crimes of Milosevic and those Serbs who actively worked to support Milosevic’ aims (including those Serbs who made weekend trips to Bosnia to “hunt Muslims”) is the international community’s lack of anything resembling resolve. The UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslava is a criminal court in that it follows the trappings and procedures of a court of law, but ICTY is a criminal tribunal in name only. The jurist presiding over Milosevic’ trial were so careful to be certain that all every “i” was dotted and every “t” crossed that they essentially allowed Milosevic to slow the pace of his own trial to a crawl. In their attempt to avoid even the appearance that they were a kangaroo court, those responsible for moving the trial along allowed Milosevic to dictate the pace, in effect turning it into a mockery.
I suppose that the end result would have been the same either way: Milosevic was buried. From where I sit, though, it would have been nice to know that his demise was the result of his being executed for his crimes. In the end, he got (or took) the easy way out, but at least he is no longer walking this Earth. There should be no doubt, though; justice delayed really is justice denied. His victims deserved better.
