MILOSEVIC TRIAL DISCUSSION ARCHIVE

Is Slobodan Milosevic getting a fair trial?
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• discussion archive

• Monday July 01, 2002 at 3:29 am
  Peter, you made a very good point. As NATO moves out, the Jihadis move in. What is the excuse for NATO's withdrawal? Resources are needed in the war on terror. Of course they cannot admit that what they have created is the new breeding-ground for terrorism. It would be a safe-losing operation to fight their own creation, so they sweep the problem under the rug. The Jihadis are not stupid. They know how to use the PR value of the ICTY. The Serbs are the bad guys, anyone else doesn't come even close. Fighting terrorism in the Balkans? That's what got the Serbs into trouble. Carla Del Ponte seems to have a vested interest in averting the war on terrorism in the Balkans, because that would implicate her as well in the financing scandal. This is purely speculation of course, but it is based on the solid fact that the trial is a radical break with the fight against terrorism even in the form it was articulated in the UN Security Council resolution (before the current US-led "war on terror"). The problem is of course that holding on to the earlier fight against terrorism would implicate the US. And probably Carla Del Ponte. She has said that now the world's focus is on terrorism, but international law doesn't function that way. If she were so concerned of international law, she would have investigated the violations of the arms embargo imposed in Security Council resolution 1160(1998). And then there is the Statute of the ICTY itself. Art. 7(2) of the statute is quite clear that the official position of an accused person doesn't relieve such person of criminal responsibility. So whatever legal backdoors concerning immunity NATO had tried to create in Appendix 2 of the Rambouillet Accord (which entered into force through Security Council resolution 1244(1999)), the immunity rules don't apply. If the prosecution wants to interpret Art. 7(3) broadly, as it obviously does, so that the "not punishing" applies even outside the military structure, the prosecution is likewise criminally responsible. The greatest crimes are now committed in the name of law. This is going to erode any trust in law in the long run, and since the status of international law has always been a bit shaky, it is going to erode international law even in the short term. Who is to punish those who started all this? Legally speaking, no one. Politically speaking, those that were their accomplices. They have created, to use a cliche, a Frankenstein monster. It is well-known that the US has used terrorists in its foreign policy. What is very well known are the services rendered by the mujaheddin in Aghanistan against the Soviet Union. It is also well-known that the same alliance was used in the Balkans. Are the mujaheddin happy? The US of course wants to deny any links with the terrorists, and this is what hurts the mujaheddin pride. This a big part of what is meant by the exploitation by the US in the Middle East. The US-sponsored terrorism feeds the anger these people feel and it ultimately spins out of control. The DEBKA article pointed out that money is a factor in enlisting in the mujaheddins. The recruits earn a salary (the jihadis movements are a major employer)! Even if NATO withdraws out of the Balkans, poverty will remain. This is poverty created largely by the sanctions and destruction. But much of the poverty is more "structural". In 1989, when the East bloc collapsed, Yugoslavia, which had been listed in the EU among the "Mediterranean countries", not the East bloc, didn't receive any foreign aid, although the problems were at least as great, while the financial flows were being redirected to the former East bloc (of which Yugoslavia wasn't part). A sudden fall in economy is poison to a multi-ethnic society, like Yugoslavia, and the inter-ethnic tensions began to mount. As soon as they erupted, the more affluent countries were there to "help" with sanctions, which only aggravated the problem! What was a mistake at first became the accepted policy. The inter-ethnic tensions could be used for western foreign-policy purposes. For instance, the western support for the Muslims was supposed to heal some of the grudges caused by the Gulf war. So the West put the Muslims to the same use as Yugoslavia before. Yugoslavia had created the "Muslims" as an ethnic group to gain support in the Non-Allied Movement, many members of which were Muslim countries. What irritated the US in the Non-Aligned Movement was that it was becoming more and more hostile to the US. Yugoslavia had wielded power in this Non-Aligned Movement far beyond its size. Now the west thought Yugoslavia could be beaten in its own game. What the west didn't take into account was the possibility that it would be beaten in this same game eventually. So why did the west think of Yugoslavia as a "threat"? First, the role in the Non-Aligned Movement played a role. Second, Yugoslavia was one of the very few regimes in Europe that remained basically socialist even after the declared collapse of the East bloc (despite its multi-party system). This was bad enough in the US eyes. Lord Owen, too, said repeatedly in his BBC interview after Milosevic had been transferred to The Hague: "He was a communist". Third, the part in the Non-Aligned Movement aligned it with some states that are now openly called terrorists. Yugoslavia had a considerable arms industry, and the products headed for countries that were antagonistic to the US. Paradoxically, the US decided to use these same allies of Yugoslavia to crush Yugoslavia. What we now see is the sucking of the west in the same vortex it has created. The ICTY has made it extremely difficult to change the direction of the US foreign policy, which may be one reason Mr Prosper wants ICTY to end its activities! This kind of erratic foreign policy is what brought Byzantium to fall. Every "Empire" eventually becomes too big for itself. Ultimately ICTY will be part of this collapse, and the longer the powers that be delay the restucturing of the tribunal, and admit they were wrong, the greater will be the fall.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Monday July 01, 2002 at 4:17 pm
  One admittance of the wrong doing is here: http://www.strategypage.com/fyeo/qndguide/default.asp?target=Bosnia
  
  Serjoe B
  Italy

• Tuesday July 02, 2002 at 3:37 am
  It may seem outrageous to say the tribunal is guilty of war crimes. So far, we have mentioned the principle "sentence first, verdict afterwards" cited in Alice in Wonderland half in jest. However, some people have taken the possibility of applying the principle so seriously that the principle is expressly prohibited in the Third Geneva Convention, Part I, Art. 3(1)(d): "...the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples". It is only because the sponsors of the tribunal consider themselves as "civilized peoples" par excellence that they fail to recognize the grave legal consequences of the numerous deaths while in detention. Denying proper medical care is against this provision. Indeed, Art. 13 states explicitly: "Any unlawful act or omission by the Detaining Power causing death or seriously endangering the health of a prisoner of war in its custody is prohibited, and will be regarded as a serious breach of the present Convention." The Third Geneva Convention applies to the prisoners of war, but why shouldn't it apply all the more to the detainees at the tribunal? Then the question is if the tribunal is "a regularly constituted court" in the meaning of Art. 3. (It is here that the nitpicking about the difference between a court and a tribunal can prove fatal.) Even if it is, I think can agree that the tribunal doesn't afford "all the judicial guarantees which are regarded as indispensable". It might even be argued that the prisoners at The Hague ARE prisoners of war. They fulfil the criteria in Art. 4, notably that of "falling into the power of the enemy". Art. 4 doesn't say this has to happen during the conflict. The Convention does say in Art. 118: "Prisoners of war shall be released and repatriated without delay after the cessation of active hostilities". However, is the tribunal in breach of this provision, or should article 118 be construed as part of the definition of "prisoner of war" (although it is in a different section altogether)? In any case, I don't think the prohibition of analogy applies here, because the Geneva Conventions are no criminal law (where the prohibition applies), although the Conventions are referred to in the Statute of the ICTY and the Statute of the ICC. On the contrary, since the ICTY is a self-styled guardian of the Geneva Conventions, it should observe the obligations laid down in it!
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Tuesday July 02, 2002 at 5:50 am
  NATO's erratic bombing could be explained partly by the wish to destroy Yugoslavia's arms industry, which had supplied some of rogue states like Libya with weapons. This might even explain some of the bombings of industrial complexes, which might have been capable of "double-use", i.e. civilian and military production. It is somewhat amusing however to realize that "miraculously, during 37,000 sorties by NATO bombers Trepca remained untouched, whereas other branches of industry were destroyed with deadly precision" as was mentioned in one of the article provided by Walter ( http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jun2002/trep-j28.shtml ). Anyway, the NATO bombing seems the older Bosnian Serb cases seem a bit trifling. Last month, "Lieutenant-General Francis Briquemon and General Sir Michael Rose, commanders of UN forces in Bosnia in 1993 and 1994, ... gave evidence against General Stanislav Galic" for shelling Sarajevo. The link provided by Walter was http://www.iwpr.net/index.pl?archive/tri/tri_271_3_eng.txt . What's the point? Here they are discussing the details of the shelling. Somehow, the source of the shells is only confirmed when it is certain they originated from the Serb positions. This at least suggests that the shelling could in principle have been mutual. Compare this to the Nato bombing, which was mainly unilateral, and any way belonged to a war of aggression. The article also mentions the shelling of the Markale market place (February 1994 and August 1995). The article calls it an infamous incident. Why? The theory in circulation is that the Bosnian Muslims shelled some of their own to gain sympathy abroad. See http://call.army.mil/fmso/fmsopubs/issues/bosnia2.htm . What may impede the official investigation is the fact that the Jihadi movements include even some of the police. In this light it is ironic that the ICTY considers Bosnia the only former Yugoslav republic that can guarantee a fair trial. The Jihadis will increase their power when NATO pulls out. It will become very interesting. As Andre reminded me earlier, the Balkan peace settlements will erupt sooner or later, because they have rested exclusively on outside intervention. Now that the outsiders leave, the explosion will certainly follow. It may become necessary to install a "strongman" in the Balkans after all. Only, who will want the job? Paddy Ashdown? At least he's not a Serb. Finally, NATO has made another attempt at catching Karadzic. ICTY needs him to provide the prosecution with Milosevic cronies in Bosnia, so the hierarchy can be traced from Milosevic to the situation on the ground. The problem is that the indictment doesn't mention the Srebrenica massacre, which is the hub of Milosevic's Bosnia indictment. Carla Del Ponte will have to "amend" the indictment any way, in order to make Karadzic of any use. There is another option which she will not consider: withdrawing the latest indictments against Milosevic. But Srebrenica or not, as long as Karadzic and Mladic are still at large, Carla will not "amend" the indictment against them, because someone might ask where the evidence is. Once they are in detention, that is no problem. Former case law will support any accusation she may fancy.
  
  J N
  Finland

• Tuesday July 02, 2002 at 10:43 am
  Peter and Jari: I couldn't agree more. In fact, the "blowback" from supporting the Bosnian Muslims and the Kosovo Albanians may catch up with the U.S. sooner than that was the case in Afghanistan, where the yesteryear's darlings of America turned into her assassins. As the trickle of emerging information detailing al Qaeda’s outposts and cells in the Balkans grows into a steady stream, the accusations against Milosevic, Karadzic and Mladic ring ever more hollow. Both the Western and Yugoslav intelligence was fully aware of bin Laden’s support of Serbia’s adversaries in both the Bosnian and Kosovo conflicts throughout the 1990s, complete with his personal appearances in the Balkans. Yet Yugoslav warnings about the spreading cancer of Muslim terrorism as a rule were met with derision and hostility and dismissed as Serb propaganda. Had the U.S. not sided with bin Laden’s Balkan protégés in attacking a sovereign European country, and lent its support to Yugoslavia instead, slamming the Balkan back door in the face of the Islamist filth, thus disrupting al Qaeda’s European terrorist network, who knows, the twin towers could be still standing tall.
  
  Andre Huzsvai
  Boston
  U.S.

• Tuesday July 02, 2002 at 5:30 pm
  I wonder if Petritsch and those he represents live in some kind of a parallel universe where they have not only propagate lies, but actually believe in them. Clearly his testimony today was just another attempt to insult the intelligence of those who know the facts cold - Milosevic in particular. Speaking to the Ramboillet and Paris proposals, he said “he met Milosevic on March 22 -- two days before NATO warplanes began bombing Serb forces to force them to leave Kosovo -- to deliver a final warning that the alternative to a peaceful settlement of the Kosovo conflict was military intervention. "My impression was that he had already made up his mind and was not really listening," he said. "For me, it was quite depressing. There was no real interest in finding a solution." Cross-examining the witness, Milosevic called the draft agreement at Rambouillet an "ultimatum" that called for the occupation of Yugoslav territory by NATO forces. Petritsch called the assertion "utterly wrong." He said the Kosovo accord was modeled on the 1995 Dayton agreement that ended the Bosnian war "which you signed." Well, Dayton did not call for unrestricted passage and unimpeded access of NATO troops THROUGHOUT THE FRY [emphasis mine - A.H.], whereas Paragraph 8, Appendix B: Status of Multi-National Military Implementation Force Rambouillet Agreement explicitly stipulated that “NATO personnel shall enjoy, together with their vehicles, vessels, aircraft, and equipment, free and unrestricted passage and unimpeded access throughout the FRY including associated airspace and territorial waters. This shall include, but not limited to, the right of bivouac, maneuver, billet, and utilization of any areas or facilities as required for support, training, and operations…. NATO.. shall be immune from all legal process, whether civil, administrative or criminal, [and] under all circumstances and at all times, immune from [all laws] governing any criminal or disciplinary offences which may be committed by NATO personnel in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia….” We have been through this before have we not? It is a matter of public record that both the Rambouillet and the Paris talks served the dual purpose of forcing the KLA into SIGNING the accord and provoke Yugoslavia into NOT SIGNING it, since the bombing campaign, already scheduled since October 1998 could have not proceeded either WITHOUT the Albanian or WITH the Yugoslav consent to the proposals, the only name for which could be “ultimatum” and “extortion.” Within this framework the main task was to make the thick-headed KLA brutes understand that their signature rejecting a “referendum for self-determination” wouldn’t be for real. The inclusion of KLA representatives into the Albanian delegation was also instrumental in internationally legitimizing an organization that would have not been tolerated in any of the NATO countries that midwifed this monster into the Balkan scene. JUST TO REVIEW: The representatives of the KLA publicly stated that the KLA would not accept the Paris agreement . At the first press conference of the KLA in Rambouillet, three Kosovo Albanians - Jasar Salihu, from Switzerland, Savri Kicmari, from Germany, and Pljeurat Sejdiju, from Great Britain, who presented themselves as the “world representatives” of the KLA, stated that “the autonomy can not be taken into consideration, as we have already had the autonomy” and that “only independence can be a subject of negotiating”. The representatives of the KLA advised Montenegro and Macedonia “to take care” about their behavior toward Albanians living there, announcing that Kosovo is only a stage in “liberating all Albanian countries”. The Albanian separatists have neither moved in the least from the proclaimed targets of “Greater Albania” nor did they have any intention to revise their views.. What was rather troubling is that such statements, as a rule, did not result in condemnation by the otherwise so sensitive “international community.” At the time of signing the Milosevic-Holbrook agreement in October 1998, the spokesman of the KLA Bardulj Mahmuti had said that “his army refuses the agreement and that they will refuse any solution by which Albanians are not guaranteed anything than autonomy within Yugoslavia.” In the talks with a special reporter of the The Washington Post, three commanders of the KLA said at the end of October 1998, ten days after the Belgrade agreement, that they were preparing to continue their “guerrilla war” since they had not received what they wished. According to their spokesman Adem Demaci, the violence in Kosovo will continue, since the Serb authorities were not ready to give them all what they wanted - the secession from Serbia. Adem Demaci in mid-November 1998 said that the KLA was a decisive political and military factor in Kosovo, which “decides whether there will be peace or war”. Fehmi Agani, the coordinator of the negotiating team of Albanians from Kosmet, in late 1998 said that “functioning of Kosovo outside Serbia is not only the will of one or the other side, but the realistic reflection of the existing situation, due to which any settlement within Serbia is not possible” . The KLA leadership announced in early December 1998, that they refused any political solution which would endanger “national ideals on independence or sanction even temporarily imposed co-life in one, so much anti-Albanian as much anti-democratic creation as Yugoslavia, that is Great Serbia, would be.” Their political representative Adem Demaci repeated then that the KLA “was ready to accept the status of the third Yugoslav republic in the transitional period” but “only with international guarantees that the Albanians will have right to self-determination after a three-year interim period.” According to Hill’s plan, by early 1999 the KLA determined itself, asserting that “the request of Albanians for independence of Kosovo was the minimum of their aspirations”. The statement of the KLA headquarters had emphasized that “Kosovo in the transitional period should be an entity with unquestionable territorial integrity”, “completely independent from the jurisdiction of Serbia and Yugoslavia”. At the end of January the KLA representatives said that they were not interested in anything except the independence of Kosovo, and that they expected the international community to accept it in the end in spite of the current refusal, as it was the case with secession of Croatia and Slovenia. On the eve of the talks in Rambouillet the Albanian separatists called on “the entire Albanian people” to support the KLA in its attempts to secure independence for Kosovo. The KLA leadership expressed its readiness “to participate in the negotiations and the will to contribute to the success of that conference which is of special importance for the future of Kosovo and the entire region.” Rambouillet, apart from its fame as a place where an unacceptable agreement was designed that aimed at producing a refusal from Yugoslavia to sign it, had also been instrumental in forging a close personal relationship between the U.S. leadership and the ringleaders of the theretofore “terrorist” KLA. The unenviable task was vigorously embraced by James Rubin, the State Department spokesman and Albright’s right hand on the public relations front. As reported by The New York Times, they met for the first time during the failed negotiations in Rambouillet in February 1999, and had several meetings in private at the U.S. embassy in Paris. Since the cornerstone of the U.S. policy in Kosovo was to get a signature from the Albanian delegation, without which they could have not launched the air war, already prepared since October 1998, wooing Thaci into signing was a must. Before Rubin was dispatched to win over Thaci, who, as the U.S. realized, would be an indispensable ally in the upcoming military operation, the White House dealt with Rugova, who was increasingly viewed as useless. Thaci, in a burst of a tunnel-visioned parochial nationalism had upset the carefully designed choreography among the Albanian participants by refusing to sign the original draft of the agreement. Someone had to explain him the rules of the game. Albright, seeing that Rubin had developed a personal rapport with Thaci, simply said: “Well, you go work on it.” During a dinner at the private residence of the U.S. ambassador, Rubin, mindful of the necessity of obtaining Thaci’s signature, jokingly promised to introduce him in Hollywood for a movie debut. Thaci wanted to know if he would e a “good” or a “bad” guy, to which Rubin responded that he did not know which way the latter would end up, in fact promising him the role of a “good” guy if he signed. Thaci signed, and the Clinton administration tied itself to the KLA, making this motley crew of Marxists, Islamists, nationalists, and drug traffickers its ally in the unsavory task of attacking a sovereign country. Washington officially argued that it was the refusal of the Yugoslav delegation to sign on to the Rambouillet peace accord that drove the U.S. into the partnership with the KLA. After the grisly work in Kosovo was done, in June 1999, Rubin was again delegated to Thaci in a mountain hideout to negotiate an agreement that called for the KLA to turn over its heavy weapons as part of a process of turning itself into a political organization. “I wouldn’t hesitate calling him a friend” said the spokesman of the U.S. State Department of the man who listed the associates of Osama Bin Laden among his comrades in the Kosovo war. Having established a bridgehead for its own military in Kosovo, and opening Pandora’s box of Albanian nationalism in the region, the U.S. left the issue of the future of the KLA unresolved.
  
  Andre Huzsvai
  Boston
  U.S.

• Tuesday July 02, 2002 at 6:39 pm
  This is from UK House of Commons Foreign Affairs - Fourth Report on Rambouillet: The Military Annex to the Rambouillet Accords 62. Another controversial area of the Rambouillet negotiations was the so-called Military Annex to the Rambouillet Accords, actually Appendix B to the Military Chapter. This Appendix set out the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) for NATO-that is to say, the rules which would govern the behaviour of and relations between NATO and the Yugoslav authorities. Controversy has focussed in particular on the broadly drafted provision which permitted NATO and affiliated forces transit through Yugoslav territory: "NATO personnel shall enjoy, together with their vehicles, vessels, aircraft, and equipment, free and unrestricted passage and unimpeded access throughout the FRY including associated airspace and territorial waters."[124] 63. Many observers have blamed the Military Annex for the unwillingness of the Serb side to sign Rambouillet: for example, the Serbian Information Centre states that the terms of the annex "were only proper for a signature by a country defeated in war."[125] The former Canadian Ambassador to Yugoslavia told the Canadian Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade that "the insistence of allowing access to all of Yugoslavia by NATO forces...guaranteed a Serbian rejection."[126] Mr Hopkinson assesses that the entrance of NATO forces into Serbia proper could not be accepted by Milosevic, and notes that this was "in fact omitted from the post-campaign settlement."[127] Read more at: http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3a63eab0446c.htm
  
  Peter Varavejke
  Belgium

• Tuesday July 02, 2002 at 8:58 pm
  “Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we venture to deceive” Check this out for me. Nato encouraged Islamic terrorist forces to enter the Bosnian conflict: Or at the very least turned a blind eye to their presence. Subsequently these forces, including Mujahedeen and allied to al Qaeda, joined (if not initiated) the campaign of terror in the Serbian province of Kosovo, where Nato acted as their air force. Having bombed the Serbian security forces out of their centuries old homeland Nato stood by while Islamic terrorist forces ethnically cleansed Kosovo of its minority population, murdering thousands in the process. Because he dared to oppose the invasion of his country by Nato and their Islamic terrorist allies Nato had Milosevic (demonised as the new Hitler) imprisoned in The Hague: where he is to take the blame for the destruction of Yugoslavia. Nato also stood by while these Islamic forces extended their campaign of terror into Macedonia, Southern Serbia and Montenegro: Here again murdering, torturing and mutilating hundreds and displacing tens of thousands. Last September elements of these same terrorist forces made vicious attacks upon the USA and announced their intention to commit more terror attacks on the USA and other western countries. Immediately President Bush and his ally Blair declared a war on global terrorism. Now Islamic terrorists continue to operate in the Balkans under Nato’s blind eye so much so that hardly any of the 200,000 Serb refugees have been able to return to Kosovo: Yet last week President Bush threatened to pull forces out of Bosnia and Nato General Secretary Robertson announced a fifteen percent reduction in KFOR. --- Did I miss something? --- Al Qaeda continues to operate in the Balkans. Read what Brian Whitmore has to say in the Boston Globe today: “During the past decade, hundreds of Islamic charities set up shop in war-ravaged Bosnia to rebuild homes, renovate schools, and feed, clothe, and shelter orphans and impoverished widows. But for some of them, law enforcement officials say, the generosity disguised a nefarious agenda: to help Al Qaeda prepare for a holy war against the United States and its allies.” … ''We detected a pattern here ... for terrorist cells and those who aid and harbor them to operate behind the shield of legitimate humanitarian ... organizations,'' Lieutenant General John Sylvester, commander of the NATO-led force in the region, said in a speech recently. “They were preaching good, and sometimes doing good, while plotting evil.” Source: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/decani/message/67737
  
  Peter Taylor
  Herts/UK

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 2:08 am
  I was reading today about senior European diplomat, "testifying" Tuesday at the war crimes trial and this is how it is reported by Associates Press (I wonder to whom this Press is accossiated to ... Enron or Worldscum?)- " Wolfgang Petritsch, part of the team ... said the Serb delegation to peace talks in February 1999 accepted a compromise providing for broad autonomy short of full independence for the Kosovo Albanians...On the last day of the talks at the French chateau in Rambouillet, the Serbian delegation chief Ratko Markovic, submitted a letter that implied agreement to the stationing of international troops in Kosovo to police the accord - a key issue that until then had deadlocked the negotiations, Petritsch said. But at a subsequent meeting in Paris three weeks later, the Serb delegation reversed itself, said Petritsch, who represented the European Union ( news - web sites) in the six-member mediation group. "There was a total change of attitude," said the Austria diplomat. He said the Serbs not only rejected the military terms, but backtracked on agreement to the political accord reached in Rambouillet. "It was clear the Yugoslav side was instructed not to achieve a positive result," he said. --------- What is missing in this "associated" report iis that new article was put in agreement that instead of ocupation of Kosovo Serbs have to submit Serbia too to NATO ocupation. Such a little addition of course shouldn't worry Milo or anybody who believes ih true intentions of "international community" compromised by few greedy lying "peacemakers". For me it is no wonder that this little detail was omitted wrom "independent" media, though it is funny how democracy is failing its promise in press.
  
  Jimi Hendrix
  Los Angeles
  US

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 5:01 am
  The Serbs did sign an agreement with the Albanians in Paris a couple of days before the bombing started. Other signatories were the diverse National Communities of Kosovo. The representatives of the Albanians were not KLA. The document they signed was basically Chapter 1 of the Rambouilet Accord. The EU Bulletin commended the Albanians for signing it. What it didn't mention was that the Serb delegation had signed it too, and that the Albanian signatories didn't belong to the KLA. - What the Markale market place shellings should teach us is that when the Bosnian Muslims ran out of "human shields" they shelled the Bosnian Muslims directly. I have never heard the term "human shield" used in the context of the Bosnian Muslim strategy, it is always used in connection with the Serbs. The closest we have come to an admission that human shields were used by the Bosnian Muslims was in the IWPR Tribunal Update above: shelling benefited both sides. And then it is supposed that the shelling came only from the Serb positions. The shelling from the Bosnian positions, if it existed at all, didn't hit anything. Of course the Serbs shouldn't have shelled at civilians, but ironically, Nato redefined the rules itself by bombing civilian targets, when they MIGHT have been used for military purposes, and even then the military purposes must be defined loosely, like "propaganda". The NATO actions were against the Geneva Conventions, as D.S. pointed out. In general, it is an infurating experience to read the IWPR Tribunal Updates. After William Walker's testimony, the Tribunal Update wrote that according to William Walker, Milosevic was willing to see only what he wanted to see. "He thought that whatever he said made it true." Isn't that all the more true of this tribunal? Let's take the body counts once more, which is something that has become entirely irrelevant in the whole show, now that they don't flatter the "non-Serbs". The sentence in the Krstic case was a limbo: the Trial Chamber was "satisfied" that 7,000-8,000 Bosnian Muslims were killed in Srebrenica. What about Kosovo? Does the tribunal see only what it wants to see? Of the 2000+ bodies found in Kosovo about 700 have been identified: 400 Serbs and 300 Albanians. Let's say the total number of the bodies is 2,100, because that is 3x700, to keep it simple. If the ratio between the Serb and the Albanian casualties is the same in the total number, that means that of the 2,100 bodies 1,200 will be Serbs and 900 will be Albanians. Let us add to the figure of the 2,000+ Serb casualties caused by the Nato bombing. Only a fraction of this number can have been Albanians, most were Serbs. Let us dismiss the HRW number of 500 right away. Let us say the real number was 2,500, as I think was claimed by the Serbian government. That would mean that in the Kosovo war the Serb death toll was 3,700 and the Albanian death toll 900. We can add to the Albanian figure the more or less plausible truck loads, but the proportion is evident. It is well-known, too, that KLA killed uncooperative Albanians, so the Serbs are not responsible for all the deaths even in that number. Does the tribunal see this? No. The tribunal sees only what it wants to see. Add to this the 500,000 Serb refugees from Croatia and the 200,000 Serb refugees from Kosovo and the thousands of refugees from Bosnia, many of whom were Bosnian Muslims (no wonder when the Bosniaks were shelling their own). The tribunal says this is not relevant, because the cases are against the Serbs. Exactly! Only, how relevant are the cases against the Serbs, if you want to catch the culprits? Or were the Serbs so demonic that they refrained from killing more non-Serbs to hide their genocidal urges and decided to constitute the majority of the total death toll? It is easy to see why the tribunal is sentencing Serbs. They are the ones that have been beaten, so no political turmoil will ensue. Of course, the prosecution cannot have known the exact figures at the time the indictments were issued. (We have learnt to accept that the prosecution can issue indictments without evidence: indeed, the "best" indictments are those with no evidence.) But nothing (technically) prevents the prosecution from issuing new indictments when the figures come out. Sure, the prosecution has made some moves in that direction, but then it sets a self-imposed time limit to the trials, like against Kosovo Albanians, something it has been constantly complaining about in the Milosevic trial. Who's to blame when the Milosevic trial is going too slowly for the prosecution? Milosevic of course. Never mind that the prosecution added 60 charges against Milosevic after he was transferred, so it should be no wonder that the time is running out. Thus it becomes one of Milosevic's crimes that he is being so thorough in the cross-examination. He is stalling! Whatever hardships Milosevic experiences are encountered by the tribunal personnel with statements like: "He has chosen his own lot in defending himself". I almost feel ashamed of my remarks about the medical care of the detainees. I saw this comment in the IWPR Tribunal Updates: "Every time Slobodan Milosevic comes off worst in a courtroom confrontation with western officials, he mysteriously falls ill." Of course, this whole thing is a big joke to the tribunal, because everybody knows that he is going to be sentenced for life. But to show how cheap the victory will be, one of the IWPR Tribunal Updates claims that Milosevic was outwitted by Paddy Ashdown. Of course Milosevic was outwitted, because whatever Paddy Ashdown says is true. It is a pity that William Walker already used this line when he gave his opinion on Milosevic.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 5:51 am
  I found an interesting conservative Jewish comment on the movie The Sum of All Fears. http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/medved.html .
  
  J N
  Finland

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 6:02 am
  I mean "Bad Company". Anyway, to show that this isn't some oddball conspiracy stuff, here is a Congressional Press Release from a Republican Party Committee from 1997, in case you haven't seen it: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/DCH109A.html . Some of the other articles on the same website of "Centre for Research on Globalisation" raise some doubts. Judge for yourself: a list of their key articles is at http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CRG204A.html .
  
  J N
  Finland

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 6:57 am
  The IWPR is funded mainly by George Soros and Nato countries. (Interesting how Soros funds the court and its the staff from the CIJ, witnesses such as Fred Abrahams and the only full-time reporting). The IWPR used to have a supporter's link to the National Endowment for Democracy which has now mysteriously disappeared. The IWPR operates in countries where Nato hopes to expand, and recuits local journalists to provide stories which boost Nato and its allies and defame Nato's enemies. Since its inception, the IWPR has run a consistent anti-Serb and anti-Milosevic campaign and was the original source of the freezer truck stories. Another case was the notorious Filipovic File which has now been disowned by the man himself. Funny how the internet's 'Journalist of the Year' has disappeared without trace. A glance at the IWPR web site shows you how many news organisations use it as a source of their stories. None of them have a permanent presence at The Hague so Mirko Klarin's poison pen letters are picked up and recycled by lazy journalists all over the world. The IWPR is nothing more than a Nato propaganda machine, which makes it all the more astonishing that in the UK it's a registered charity! Gerard Killoran
  
  Gerard Killoran
  London
  United Kingdom

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 8:40 am
  Today on the WSWS: The Milosevic Trial: Key prosecution witness discredited http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jul2002/icty-j03.shtml
  
  D S
  Netherlands

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 9:36 am
  There is a forum on Milosevic trial on http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?14@@.ee8ce1c I believe that most of You participants here can raise the level of the forum of "The New York Times"
  
  Sergio B
  Italy

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 10:14 am
  Tt's been mentioned here recently that the Trepca mining complex was not bombed during the 1999 NATO war, despite having been a more obvious "military traget" than say, Radiotelevision Serbia. Why so? The following re-posting is courtesy of Jared Israel and Diana Johnstone (28 February 2000). Comparison of two documents, a November 1999 International Crisis Group (ICG) paper on the Trepca mining complex, and a February 23, 2000 article in the Toronto Star by ICG consultant Susan Blaustein, provides an exceptionally clear glimpse into the workings of the "international community". The International Crisis Group is a high-level think tank supported by financier George Soros. It was set up in 1995, primarily to provide policy guidance to governments involved in the NATO-led reshaping of the Balkans. Its leading figures include top U.S. policy maker Morton Abramowitz, the eminence grise of NATO's new "humanitarian intervention" policy and sponsor of Kosovo Albanian separatists. Last November 26 [1999 - A.H.], the ICG issued a paper on "Trepca: Making Sense of the Labyrinth" which advised the United Nations Mission In Kosovo (UNMIK) to take over the Trepca mining complex from the Serbs as quickly as possible and explained how this should be done. The February article by the ICG journalist represents a vulgarization of the anti-Serb position designed to prepare public opinion for carrying out the ICG policy. There will no doubt be more. The ICG Paper: Manipulative Ambiguities Trepca is a conglomerate of some 40 mines and factories, mostly but not all in Kosovo, notably including Stari Trg, "one of the richest mines in Europe" and the richest in the Balkans, currently shut down, and the Zvecan smelter, located northwest of Mitrovica and still being operated by Serb management. The ICG calls on UNMIK, headed by Bernard Kouchner, to cut through legal disputes over the industry's ownership and take over management of Trepca itself. On July 25 [2000 - A.H.], Kouchner issued a decree that "UNMIK shall administer movable or immovable property, including monetary accounts, and other property of, or registered in the name of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia or the Republic of Serbia or any of its organs, which is in the territory of Kosovo". The ICG paper concluded that "UNMIK and KFOR should implement a rapid and categorical takeover of the Trepca complex, including the immediate total shutdown of the environmentally hazardous facilities at Zvecan". What is really wrong with Zvecan is that it is run by Serbs and provides revenue to Yugoslavia. But in the "game-plan of measures" recommended by the ICG, UNMIK is advised to instruct a "Zvecan environmental assessment team" to report on the status of the equipment and thereupon "advise as to what measures must be taken"... Environmental hazards are to be the pretext to shut down Zvecan and deprive the last Serbs in Kosovo of their livelihood. Meanwhile, "Stari Trg, one of the richest mines in Europe, must be potentially profitable again and should be a priority for donors interested in setting Kosovo on its feet". The game-plan calls for a gradual start up of mining to reassure the "Kosovars", meaning ethnic Albanians, of their future. For although the ICG says that the "workforce and management of all Trepca facilities should be selected on a merit basis only", it adds that "no one with ties to the Belgrade regime should be considered" -- and it is habitual to identify all Serbs with "the Belgrade regime", even to ignore their existence other than as "agents of Milosevic". This blatant takeover of valuable property in what is still nominally part of Serbia is of course justified as a necessary measure to reassure the oppressed Albanians. "The return to work of even a few hundred Kosovar miners would represent, for all Kosovars, the reclaiming of their patrimony". The media event is easy to imagine. But if the ICG hostility toward the Serbs seems genuine, the love for the Albanians may be less than perfect. In the ICG's brief account of past ethnic clashes over Trepca management, underlying the habitual anti-Serb bias is the basic hypocrisy of dominant powers manipulating two peoples against each other. The ICG report notes that Trepca "has long stood for Kosovar Albanians as the symbol of Serbian oppression and of their own resistance", and recounts that after 1974, finally able to manage the Trepca facilities themselves, Kosovars "created thousands of jobs", but that "in 1981-82, a sort of `Trepca-gate' scandal -- in which Kosovar Albanian workers were accused of having stolen vast quantities of gold and silver -- was the pretext for firing many engineers and technicians". Whether the theft was real or merely a "pretext" is of no interest to the international community ... so long as the Serbs were in charge. But afterwards? The report concludes that: "Simply handing Trepca over to the Kosovars is ruled out by the shortage of modern skills available locally, the need for internationally-verifiable standards to avoid corruption" as well as damage to the installations. And as for those "thousands of jobs" created by and for Kosovo Albanians, they are not on the international community agenda. "The social impact of the reduced work force would need to be balanced against the need for competitively based private investment", the ICG observes. Fortunately, the ICG finds that the young leadership of the "Kosovo Liberation Army" is "somewhat impatient" with the older Kosovo Albanian leadership group's interest in "a huge workforce" and prefers modernization that will require foreign investment capital. No wonder Washington chose to back the violent KLA. The manipulative hypocrisy of the ICG policy designers is even more blatant concerning the Serbs. The ICG urges UNMIK to hurry up with the game plan for taking over the valuable mining complex _before_ Serbian elections so that a new government more to the West's liking cannot be accused of "losing Trepca". All Serbian leaders, including opposition leaders, the ICG observes, will have to protest when UNMIK takes over Trepca and the Zvecan smelter. "However they could exploit the argument that the `loss' was due to the pariah status of Milosevic himself, so that once again Serbia has lost assets due to his presence in office. So provided action were taken before any elections in Serbia it need not upset, and might contribute to, any strategy for unseating Milosevic." In short, the international community is going to take over Trepca whoever is in charge in Belgrade; better do it while Milosevic is there, so that the Western-backed "progressive, democratic" opposition can pretend it was the fault of Milosevic! Media Propaganda: Familiarity versus Truth Such cynicism is hard to surpass, but there is always room to add a few lies. This is the task of the media propaganda aimed at getting the general public to swallow the policies decided by elite think tanks and governments. The February 23, 2000 article in The Toronto Star by ICG senior consultant Susan Blaustein, "Mitrovica flashpoint for the next Balkan war", deserves a Jamie Shea award for the most shameless war propaganda of the month. The clichés are all there, "centuries-old hatreds" (not our fault, folks); then focus on the single culprit: Milosevic; the unreliable French seeking appeasement versus the need for the international community to display "backbone" and stand up to "Milosevic's test of its resolve". For Blaustein, it is Milosevic, of course, who is causing trouble in the city of Mitrovica because of his "keen financial interest" in the Trepca mining complex and the Zvecan smelter. NATO has occupied Kosovo and watched for eight months while Albanians murder, terrorize and drive out most of the non-Albanian population, but Blaustein is able to write (and the newspaper to publish) that: "The city is a lynchpin in Belgrade's `Greater Serbia' strategy of expelling non-Serbs from the region." The November 1999 ICG report noted that: "International financial officials have long recognized the minerals industry as being prime for money laundering" throughout the world because of its structure and suggested that "the interest of the Milosevic circle in exploiting the Trepca facilities might go beyond the simple operation of sharing out the profits." This speculation is taken a step further by Blaustein, who writes that the smelter in Zvecan "is widely believed to have served the regime as an efficient money-laundering mechanism". But in any case, if the Serbs are running Zvecan to their profit, why would they want to make trouble? Ah, that Milosevic! It is because "Mitrovica is Milosevic's only remaining foothold in Kosovo" so "he has decided to call the bluff of the international community". The world is one big "test of wills" where little guys are forever "calling the bluff" of giants so the giants will wipe them out. The little guys seem to enjoy doing that, don't ask why. Blaustein goes on to excuse the Albanians for recent violence and blame the French. It is not the Serbs who are being driven out of Kosovo, but the Albanians who are victims of "Milosevic's operatives" who "monitor, harass, terrorize and expel ethnic Albanian civilians who dare to live in or travel to the Serb side of town". The rocket attack on a bus carrying Serb civilians, which killed two of them, was "not unprovoked"; the Albanians were impatient with the international community for turning a blind eye to "Serbs' oppression of ethnic Albanians"... By not allowing mobs of angry ethnic Albanians to take over the last part of Kosovo where Serbs are still managing to live more or less normally, "international officials are abandoning the U.N.'s stated commitment to create and protect a multi-ethnic society in Kosovo", according to Blaustein. This tract is meant to cast the blame in advance for what Blaustein calls the "next Balkan war". It is in total contradiction to the facts of what has been happening in Kosovo during eight months of foreign occupation. How then can anyone dare to write or publish such an article? The answer is that the propagandists are counting on the tendency of uninformed readers to mistake what is familiar for what is true. The cliches about "Milosevic" and "Greater Serbia" are familiar. The truth is not. If and when the "next Balkan war" breaks out and the "international community" takes full control of the Trepca industrial complex, the distracted public need not pay too much attention, since everybody already knows what it's all about: that evil dictator Milosevic is causing trouble again. (February 28, 2000)
  
  Andre Huzsvai
  Boston
  U.S.

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 10:18 am
  RE: SARAJEVO SHELLING AND SNIPING FLASHBACK 1992 BREADLINE MASSACRE “Borisa Starovic, M.D., the Dean of the Medical School at the University of Sarajevo, worked at the hospital where the victims of the so called "breadline massacre" were brought. It was reported on Western TV as an artillery or mortar attack on civilians standing in line for bread: and attack by Serbian forces AT JUST THE MOMENT that the two only professional TV cameras in the city were on hand to film the explosions. Starovic, who served as a Chief Coroner at his hospital at this time and personally examined the bodies, found it very odd that there were no lacerations or puncture wounds on any of the victims. neither were there any head or chest wounds, only trauma to the lower extremities. He concluded that the wounds were obviously not caused by artillery shells; they were the result of a pre-planted demolition charges placed by Bosnian Muslim forces, triggered for the benefit of the TV cameras. For further proof, the surface of the "attack" area evidenced no star-shaped shell holes, which are typical of such explosions. Instead, there were two concentric circular holes that now are covered with flowers. Several Muslim families were evacuated from their homes in the immediate area of the "attack" just prior to the media event.” Chronicles, June 1994. pp. 38-39 FLASHBACK 1994 Senior Official Admits to Secret U.N. Report on Sarajevo Massacre New York For the first time, a senior U.N. official has admitted the existence of a secret U.N. report that blames the Bosnian Moslems for the February 1994 massacre of Moslems at a Sarajevo market. Yasushi Akashi, the Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and the former head of the U.N. mission in Bosnia, told the German Press Agency DPA that the secret report is "no secret." An international outcry over the massacre, in which 68 civilians perished at Markale marketplace, led directly to a toughening of Western policy towards the Serbs, who were widely blamed for the incident. But there have been persistent rumours at the United Nations ever since that a U.N. report clearly blamed the Moslems for firing on their own people in order to create international sympathy and get the West to fight on their side against the Serbs. Until Thursday, U.N. officials strongly denied the report existed, even after it was quoted in press reports. Akashi told DPA that not only did the first report exist, but that some journalists already had a copy. He said the details were in a 1995 story by U.S. journalist David Binder, who quoted from the confidential report. According to Binder, the report said U.N. peacekeepers were prevented by Moslem police from entering the site in the aftermath of the explosion. No doctors were allowed on the scene and the 197 victims were carried away to hospital within 25 minutes. After studying the crater left by the mortar shell and the distribution of the shrapnel, the report concluded that the shell was fired from behind Moslem lines. U.N. monitors reported no Serbian shelling that day from points near the marketplace. The official U.N. report that was subsequently released said the evidence as to who fired the shell was inconclusive, since it originated from an area where Moslem and Serb lines were very close. The two reports represented divergent views, but the United Nations chose to publish the neutral report and keep the other secret. The incident led to a NATO ultimatum to Bosnian Serbs to withdraw their heavy weapons from around Sarajevo. At the time, Madeleine Albright, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said: "It's very hard to believe any country would do this to their own people, and therefore, although we do not exactly know what the facts are, it would seem to us that the Serbs are the ones that probably have a great deal of responsibility." Deutsche Presse-Agentur, June 6, 1996 FLASHBACK 1994 "SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina - French peacekeeping troops in the U.N. unit trying to curtail Bosnian Serb sniping at civilians in Sarajevo have concluded that until mid-June some gunfire also came from government soldiers deliberately shooting at their own civilians. After what it called a "definitive" investigation, a French marine unit that patrols against snipers said it traced sniper fire to a building normally occupied by Bosnian soldiers and other security forces. A senior French officer said: "We find it almost impossible to believe, but we are sure that it is true." They say the sniper fire from the government position stopped in mid-June, when, after several months of suspicion that the building was being used by snipers, a gunman was seen firing from the building. The officers say they notified the Bosnian army that the sniper was about to be shot by French troops, as they are authorized to do. "We were going to kill him just as we shoot Serb snipers," said a French officer involved in the investigation. The Bosnian army protested that it knew nothing about the gunman, but firing from the building immediately stopped, the officer said. Officers in the anti-sniping unit said they were inclined to believe that renegade elements in the Bosnian military were also shooting at civilians in an attempt to generate news coverage that increased international sympathy for the Bosnian government. Members of the U.N. anti-sniping unit, who said they are equipped with infrared and thermal viewing devices to watch suspected snipers' nests, said they began their investigation after studying the trajectory of bullets striking near central Sarajevo. They concluded that some of the shooting was coming from the former Parliament building. "It was the only place where some of the snipers could be," said a soldier on the investigating team. To test their suspicions, they said, they set a trap. Beginning on June 8, they put one of their armored vehicles near the buildings used by Bosnian Serb snipers, while other vehicles were hidden on either side of the former Parliament building. For the next week, officers said, there were many times when no firing was heard from the Bosnian Serb positions, while shots were heard coming from the former Parliament building. Then for three days, for several hours at a time, a U.N. armored personnel carrier was stationed so it could be clearly seen from the building. While it was there, no sniper bullets were recorded hitting in the areas of Sarajevo monitored by the anti-sniping unit. When the armored personnel carrier was withdrawn, firing directed toward those areas resumed, French officers said. FLASHBACK 1995 “They [the Muslims] have committed this carnage on their own people?” I exclaimed in consternation. “Yes,” confirmed the Prime Minister [Eduard Balladour] without hesitation, “but at least they have forced NATO to intervene.” Jean Daniel, editor of the Le Nouvel Observateur, in the August 31, 1995 issue, “No More Lies About Bosnia”
  
  Andre Huzsvai
  Boston
  U.S.

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 3:46 pm
  Did anybody noticed that yesterday V.Petrich ex governor of Bosnia admitted INDIRECTLY that the Nato's plan was to occupy Yugoslavia when he said that the "B amendment" contains the same rules as in Dayton's agreement for Bosnia and the intention was to apply it also to Yugoslavia. He said to Milo: You shoud have signed it as You did in Dayton and avoid bombardements. Also the childs know that the Bosnia is not a sovereign State, thus admitting the real Nato'intentions.
  
  Serjoe B
  Italy

• Wednesday July 03, 2002 at 4:12 pm
  Al-Qaeda still active in Kosovo and Macedonia reports Jamie Dettmer of Insight. The war on global terror fizzles out in the Balkans as the USA and Nato adopt a hands off approach. Considering all that has been posted on this board you don’t have to ask why. “Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we venture to deceive.” Source: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/decani/message/67787
  
  Peter Taylor
  Herts/UK

• Thursday July 04, 2002 at 4:49 am
  Serjoe, I haven't visited the New York Times forum, but I think any of us can raise the level of the IWPR Tribunal Update, which can in fact be the "root of all evil" of the biased reporting in the mainstream media, as was indicated by Gerard. Where is all the Soros money going if this is the level of reporting it can buy? It must go to the tribunal so it will produce the kinds of stories that are easy to report. Andre mentioned jokingly the "Jamie Shea award". Are there any other awards? The IWPR must have them all. I think the Congressional Press Release from the Republican Party Committee shows that a critical view of the recent history of the Balkans and the western part played in it does not have to be relegated to the fringe. The report makes many conspiracy theorists look tame in comparison, and I gather from Andre's postings that the information is reliable. But the report is from 1997 when the Internet was barely accessible, so it is no wonder it has been eclipsed by the more recent material. Of course, the report can be dismissed as political smear by the Republicans, but that doesn't make it any more untrue. Smear exists, and I think the recent 9-11 theories show that. I don't believe them. The same sources that now say that George W. Bush was behind the attacks said a few months ago that Israel was behind the attacks. When they saw a little smear won't stop Ariel Sharon, they pinned the smear on George W. Bush. After all, he is not the "democratically elected president", so he has been a sort of conspiracy from the start. However, I doubt any of us has witnessed this kind of ferocity behind our earlier conspiracy theories, and I think a lot of that can be attributed to the omnipresence of the Internet. But some of the stuff is really weird. One French theory suggests that the 9-11 planes were remote-controlled and that the passenger lists were faked. The author of that book is nowadays a popular speaker in the Arab countries. It is worth distancing from some of the conspiracy theories, because the 9-11 and the Balkan imbroglio are often lumped together. The difference is that even a 7-year-old can in principle conclude that the official version of the events in the Balkans is a myth. All you need is master your sums. I am sorry that I can't find anywhere the article that (I think) stated that 400 Serbs and 300 Albanians have been identified out of the 2,000 thousands bodies collected in Kosovo. But if that is correct, there is no way the official version (if there is in fact an official version any more) is patently false. I would imagine that the Albanians would be identified first, so it may even be that the number of the 300 dead Albanians may not be very much higher than that (although it must be admitted that many of them probably don't have anything to identify them by). I think this is suggested by the recent UN statements that now the UN staff can lend its ear to the relatives of the approximately 2,000 missing Serbs (followed by the statement that they may never be found). If the number of the bodies is indeed 2,100, that would explain the whereabouts of 1,800 missing Serbs (if the Albanian death toll is indeed as low as 300, which it probably isn't). On the other hand, sometimes the number of bodies is said to be even higher, which is bound to tilt the balance even more, increasing the likelihood that the overwhelming majority of the bodies are Serbs. I don't know in what number the casualties caused by the Nato bombing in Kosovo are included. They may not be included in the 2,000+ figure cited by the Serb authorities after the bombing, but in this higher (but indefinite) "international" figure of the Kosovo bodies. I hope they can sort out the mess before the next Balkans crisis erupts. The tip is again Kosovo, where the Albanians are angry before the Belgrade and Skopje have moved the Kosovo-Macedonian border a bit, giving some of Kosovo to Macedonia. Or was it the other way around? But what does it matter anyway, when the same NLA/KLA controls both sides of the border? It is a matter of principle, because the UN has given Belgrade the power to decide on Kosovo. Maybe one should ask who gave the power to the KLA/NLA to decide on both Kosovo and Macedonia. You may have heard that the radio communications of the NLA were tapped in some European capital, and now the tapes are at the VPRO radio station in Holland. The Dutch officials have said they are real. The point is that the tapes reveal the NLA was part of the KLA, and both were run by the Americans, who gave them the radio connections, which were then tapped by someone else. But is that something new? What matters is which part of what we already know has an official confirmation (and such a confirmation has come ever more frequently from the Dutch). Maybe the Americans feel they have nothing more to conquer as they decide to pull out of the Balkans. However, as the Republican Party Committee's report suggests, the Republicans consider the whole mess to be part of the Clinton debacle. It is becoming a very strange mix of Clinton and Bush. Maybe it is a bad idea to pull out, but the point is that NATO should never have entered the Balkans in the first place. If outsiders hadn't intervened, the development might have been at least more peaceable. But what can yo do? The Bosnian Muslims and the Kosovo Albanians at least are fully aware of the capabilities of the PR and the effects of creating a humanitarian catastrophe. The Western opinion gets in a moral panic, and asks why we don't do something. The point is that it is not enough to do SOMETHING, as we can now see. The decisions shouldn't be made in Western capitals. What do they know? The ICTY prosecution still has trouble figuring out who the commander-in-chief of the Yugoslav Army was in 1995. (By the way, I don't know the answer, but I am sure it wasn't Milosevic. Or was he?) Finally, Andre's comment on the ICG paper on Trepca was excellent. I just wonder how NATO knew in the spring of 1999 that it shouldn't bomb the complex, if the ICG report came out later in the same year (November). The Trepca connection has been dismissed on the ground that raw materials don't influence political decisions in the way they did before and immediately after the Second World War. However, the fact that the complex was left intact in the bombing suggests that Trepca was part of the plan from the start.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Thursday July 04, 2002 at 11:20 am
  Use language that a child can understand, make the lie simple, repeat it often and even the most intelligent will believe it. Mainstream media is neither objective nor accurate. On the daily basis they distort what they report and refuse to report what they should. Reporters claim to have control over what they report while their editors claim that they control the final product. This is the case of Kosovo and hundreds of Bosnia’s world wide. I believe it is the ones who own the media that have the final say. Freedom of the media as Michael Parenti writes in his “Inventing Reality” belongs to “the man who owns one”. What is said and what is left out does not serve reality or the truth but reflects the need of the owners. Parenti writes that Walter Cronkite signed off his nightly news with: “And that’s it is way it is”, however, when he retired he admitted that it was not that way at all. He said when he retired “My lips have been kind of buttoned for almost twenty years”. Cronkite like others in his league were paid big bucks to have their lips buttoned. The recent New York tragedy silenced anyone who questioned the real cause of the attack on America. Some were silenced for fear of losing their jobs for telling the truth while others were silenced because they feared of losing their jobs if they did not lie. From monopoly politics to monopoly economics the mainstream media has become a sort of cheerleader rather than a critical analyst and educator of a society that needs to see itself as others see it. Ever since “the rule of 86” (creation of a two party system and laws to keep others out) American politics Democrat-Republican have provided America with sameness. The media was used to destroy the alternative. Starting with the socialist movement of the 20’s to the environmental movement of today. This was done in the name of big business by the media that was owned and controlled by big business. Today this is even more dangerous as the mainstream media as Parenti states is in the pay of the CIA. He also states that CIA owns over 200 wire services world wide. Need I say more? There is, as he writes an “interlocking control” of the media. The directors of the media outlets, control over 80% of the news, sit on boards or are tied to the major corporations in America. Owners, advertisers, editors, military industrial complex and government are in the same pocket. The next big lie will feature Saddam Hussein's stepson Saffi who was arrested in Miami on visa violation. It will read something like this. Saffi was a member of the Iraqi Secret Service Mudiriyat al-Amn al-Amma that is behind his illegal entrance into United States. His plans were to commandeer a plane and commit an act of sabotage on the 4th of July. This is the ‘smoking gun’ that will tie Iraq to international terrorism. The excuse Bush needs for Desert Storm II.
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Thursday July 04, 2002 at 1:28 pm
  A witness called Jogai, excuse my poor Albanian spelling, being myself Iberian, described the exhumation of bodies in a fire-range and how they were loaded in a refrigerator truck, all conducted under orders from the Serb police. The statement given by Jogai in Febr-March 2000 does not mention this event, but a second statement given in June 2000 brings it to light. Mr. Milosevic asked him when did this exhumation take place in the fire-range, to what the witness replied it took place in the spring of 2000. Mr. Milosevic clarified the date again and Jogai, replied again and again that it was in May or April of 2000. Judge May (NATO and more than that) asked Mr. Milosevic what his point was, why was the date, the precise date , whether April or May, spring time, so relevent, Miss Romano (NATO) also said she did not understand the point. "Well, the point is" Mr. Milsoevic said, "that in the spring of 2000 no Serb police was in Kosovo, none what so ever"
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Connecticut, USA

• Thursday July 04, 2002 at 1:31 pm
  Jogai's testimony give July 3 was continued today, with a very telling surprised. This morning he remembered the event with much clarity: it was in May 1999! And the prosecution introduced an ademdum to correct the statement dates as well as the summary given by Miss Romano. Further Jogai told judge May and the court, he spoken to none since the day before, none!
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Connecticut, USA

• Thursday July 04, 2002 at 2:09 pm
  I also saw the part, it was hilarious. It clearly shows how witnessess are coached and spoon fed with stories. And the fact that none of the judges noticed this during the witness his testimony and subsequently during the cross examination tells enough on the attention that they are paying to what is hapening in their courtroom. It doesn't matter probably: their judgement is already made. What are they playing on those monitors: TETRIS?
  
  Peter Varavejke
  Belgium

• Thursday July 04, 2002 at 5:54 pm
  Peter. Gogol, I saw the same segment. The lies from the witness did not surprise me, the arrogance and tone of MR. MAY lowers him to a level of a schoolyard bully. My God the man’s manner is repulsive. May’s manner and tone of voice is reprehensible, as he said in a most arrogant way “I am asking the questions now”. Milosevic wanted to know to whom the witness spoke between the two sessions as it was obvious that someone coached him to correct the inconsistencies in his testimony. May asked “Did someone from the prosecution speak to you?” The witness replied, “No!” That answer satisfied Mr. May and he refused to allow Milosevic any further questions. as he wanted to show that someone did coach this witness. ----- I don’t know how this man can call himself a judge. The defense has the right to question his accusers until the cows come home but not in May’s courtroom. What a farce?
  
  walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Friday July 05, 2002 at 12:45 am
  The grave digger appeareance at the hague was the lowest point of the prosecution testimony.What ever happened in Yougoslavia is a political event and the truth is that only the heads of states and nato can explain what really happened. All this line of peaseants show us what everybody knows about war. Every war has civilian deaths and destruction. Mr May gets very irritated when the defendant tries to explain the broader aspect of the conflict,but lets the prosecution and their witnesses to engage in long explanations. I think Mr May patience is running thin and I wonder what will happend next: Don't forget there is Bosnia and Croatia and aftyer that is the defence Kosovo Bosnia and Croatia. I do not see the importance of this court .It will not solve anything They are talking about events already down the river.Also the trial opens the wounds of the war .I do not see peace between the serbs and albanians.Every single kosovar that testified expressed his hate towards the serbs.
  
  Vasile Ianos
  NJ

• Friday July 05, 2002 at 2:51 am
  Sorry for sounding ridiculous, but the body count in Kosovo seems to me to be the following: 300 Albanians identified, 400 Serbs identified, approximately 2000 Serbs unidentified. This would account for the entire Kosovo death toll, which has been reported to be 2,000 - 3,000. On the other hand, it would also account for the missing Serbs, which are about 2,000. Everybody knows that they are among the bodies found in Kosovo, but no-one dare draw the conclusion that the number of dead Albanians is only in the hundreds. However, there are indications that most of the Albanians have been identified, because the UN now openly turns to the Serbs. Add to this the 2,000+ Serbs (and other nationalities) killed in the bombing in Serbia proper. That would bring the number of Serbs killed in the Kosovo war (and the events leading to it) to about 4,400. The number of Albanians would be 300. These deaths are partly caused by the KLA and Nato bombings. I know this sounds ridiculous but do you have any other interpretation of the numbers that have been handed to us? The low number of the Albanians would explain why Louise Arbour decided to go to the Supreme Court of Canada after the "killing fields" were first discovered. It would explain why the prosecution is coming up with these implausible freezer truck stories (nobody has explained to me why the bodies had to be frozen). It would also explain the need for the prosecution to resort to Mr Ball's computer-created death toll. It would also explain why Carla Del Ponte issued an indictment on Bosnia and Croatia, where there are bodies, although Milosevic hardly played there any role. They are in panic. Next time you see Carla Del Ponte's face ask yourself if she would be capable of something like that. If the figures I have given are even approximately accurate, it would be an unrebuttable proof that the Serb forces had categorical instructions not to harm Albanian civilians. If this secret came out, it would be a clear signal for future generations not to minimize the casualties to the civilians on the enemy side because otherwise you might end up being called a war criminal. So the refusal of the US to ratify and then to sign the ICC Statute doesn't necessarily indicate that the US is planning to commit war crimes. On the contrary, it might indicate that the decision-makers know what is happening at The Hague. And they know how much the Americans are hated for it, so the political indictments against the Americans would be inevitable. But what happens when you try to nail anyone of these people down? They will perhaps use the word "methodology", which Lord Robertson used in his BBC interview with Tim Sebastian when asked how Nato explains the inflated figures of damage done to the Serbian military. Lord Robertson answered time and again: we used a different methodology. The Canadian foreign secretary countered the low death toll in the Kosovo "killing fields" by saying that the Serbs are playing a numbers game. Well, actually it was the international troops that were investigated the alleged killing fields. The truth will come out eventually, but I hope that it will come out before the sentence is handed down. This tribunal is dangerous. What should we do? I know we are politically divided, but what I am asking myself is this: if the Republicans want to keep the US out of the ICC, if they want the American troops out of the Balkans, if they want to fight terrorism, if they want the ICTY to wrap up its activities, why is the Congress still funding the ICTY? The 1997 report was a good start, but it isn't enough. The Republican party should prepare another report on the advisability of funding the ICTY. They should ask what the forensic research of the "killing fields" has delivered so far. They should ask whether Carla Del Ponte knew about the funding of Balkan terrorists through Swiss bank accounts. They should ask if the ICTY can guarantee a fair trial, which even the ICC cannot, in their view. Those in the Republican party or close to it should remind the decision-makers of the unanswered questions. I think they would love to get rid of the ICTY, but the Americans can hardly tell Ljubljana and Skopje apart, so maybe they are just afraid. You see, I am using here a different "methodology" from the one we have been used to. In the present political climate you have to approach the political right. If you have been following how the Muslim organizations do business, you know that it is extremely important to contact the decision-makers. Not just the media, although that is important too. Somebody made the clever remark that Ms Amanpour wouldn't suddenly admit on air that what she has been preaching for the last few years has been rubbish. So the decision-makers need some reassuring before they are going to take the heat from the big media. The ICTY might also threaten the Americans with an indictment, but then the ICTY would be sure to lose funding. See? By changing the "methodology" we might be on the winning side.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Friday July 05, 2002 at 2:38 pm
  The Rambouillet "Treaty"'s Appendix B -- the unconditional occupation/surrender ultimatum -- was not in the Dayton Treaty, according to the expert on the D.T., during our discussion on H-Diplo in May-Jun99. (See the discussion logs.)
  Again, Appendix B is the key to this, just as the Katyn Massacre was the Silver Bullet issue which brought down the Soviet regime. It makes Kosovo one of the worst war crimes in our history.
  I have read that the new International Criminal Court will not take up things which occurred before its inception. Is this true?
  
  Lou Coatney
  Macomb
  Illinois USA

• Friday July 05, 2002 at 2:42 pm
  On Thursday an Albanian from Kosovo called Barisha presented himself as a lawyer , also as the founder of a human rights organization, as a self appointed violations investigator. He brought with him lists of people, killed people, disappeared people he had himself investigated. Miss Romano asked him: "Mr. Barisha what is your profession?" to which the witness replied in Albanian: " Jurist" and the interpreter translated by:"Lawyer" So, it went on and on until Mr. Milosevic asked him his first question: "You, you said you're a lawyer?" to which Barisha answered: "Well, not so. It must have been an interpreter mistake, I was working as legal advisor to a construction company" Mr. Milosevic insisted: " A legal advisor to a construction company? What exactly did you do for that company?" to what Barisha said:" I was actually doing administrative work in the office" Today Sandra Mitchell the head of the human rights violation division of the OCSE for Kosovo, someone who worked in Kosovo during the brief stay of the Kosovo Verification Mission was cross-examined under the duress of judge May(NATO) who kept interrupting and advancing his understanding of the line of questions and worse yet, the answers of Sandra Mitchell. It turned out that the OCSE had created this human rights division just for the occasion of the case of Kosovo. The OCSE had never been involved in investigating any human rights violations any where before, and probably never will again. Naturally human rights violations against Serbs were not investigated since the mission did not have the "mandate" for that.
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Connecticut, USA

• Friday July 05, 2002 at 3:07 pm
  London policeman, turned amateur, Hendrie, forensic operator for the Racak massacre and dilettante photographer came back briefly to give testimony once more regarding the pictures he took himself in Racak, some with blood, some without it of the same corpses. He was examined once more by the prosecution, which kept referring to "computer generated" set, another set of the same pictures. Only few pictures were shown to the public during the comparison display of the two picture, with and without blood. Hendrie, explained that the camera angle was responsible for the omission of the blood in the pictures. But under cross examination which was again difficult, when judge May (NATO) kept protecting the witness, indeed the whole OCSE from the inquisitive verb of Mr. Milosevic, it became clear that the section of the soil where the blood, the pool of blood, was visible in both pictures. 'How come the angle of the camera can be the cause in this case?" Mr. Milosevic asked. Hendrie gave the same explanation, actually he said he had explained already. Judge Kwoon (OCCUPIED), the best of the judges in my humble opinion, asked the technicians to show those pictures in the video system "so that the public could see". Mr. Milosevic described graphically in detail, the soil, the distance of the referenced imbedded in the soil stone, the hat, visible soil with blood and without blood. Judge May ended shortly after the cross-examination.
  
  Golgol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 4:48 am
  I just want to commend the participants in this forum for their daily incisive and well-informed commentary. The Hague Tribunal is an outrage against justice and common human decency. Richard May clearly has no business presiding over any Western court of law. I've just been reading the transcripts of Stalin's show trials. It's eerie how similar the two proceedings are, including the Soviet judge's repeated interventions during the defense's cross-examination with the admonition "irrelevant." It's up to all of us to get this story out. Writing articles, writing letters to newspapers (pointing out in particular their reporters' dependence on IWPR's postings, sending out portions of the "trial" transcripts, taking part in discussion forums such as the one in the New York Times are all essential. I intend to do my bit and would appreciate any help from anyone. George Szamuely New York, NY, USA
  
  george szamuely
  usa

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 4:56 am
  Yes Lou, the ICC will not act retrospectively. However the ICTY is still going strong. So why in the name of justice has the ICTY never indicted anyone but Serbs over the crimes against humanity in Kosovo? The superior number and horror of the crimes by the KLA and its variants are manifest. Also these forces are allied to Mujahedeen and al-Qaeda: war on global terror? What a sick joke! As for Nato crimes, the most of significant of which was the indiscriminate use of cluster bombs mainly by the RAF, this is brushed aside with the disgustingly dishonest argument “we didn’t INTEND to harm civilians”.
  
  Peter Taylor
  Herts/UK

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 10:07 am
  At the beginning of the 'trial', Judge May ruled the 'prosecutor' team themselves could not be 'witnesses' as it would be 'heresay' , 'repreticious', 'selective', and not 'fair' to the accused. Now along comes Sandra Mitchell, who obviously was tasked the assignment of building a case against Serbia and Milosevic, after the bombs started to fall. Her 'data' found its way into the indictment and I'm convinced, after the cross examination, that she's part of the 'team'. Listening to her rambling insignificant 'testimony' on her 'reponsibilities' and'methology' was a waste of time. All allowed by Judge May, who only interupted when Milosevic was speaking.
  
  Joe P
  Wis,USA

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 10:21 am
  During the Gulf War when Iraqi forces set fire to the oil fields the Western Press and the American Government called this environmental terrorism. The bombing of the Yugoslav oil storage sites, chemical plants, and the use of depleted uranium weapons will have environmental consequences well into this century. The bombing of the Pancevo oil facility threatens some of the world’s best known wetlands. The aquifer where most people in Vojvodina get their drinking water is on the verge of being contaminated with heavy metals. Peter, the RAF gentlemen who dropped those cluster bombs have forgotten that hundreds of their fathers and grandfathers were saved by Serbian forces when they had to ditch their damaged planes on their return from bombing the Ploesti Oil Fields in Romania during WWII. Milan Kundera once said “The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting”. The West wants Milosevic relegated to the “dustbin of history”. They want the NATO action to be remembered as a humanitarian act and on with the next mission. NATO has learned well from Nazi propaganda. People have a short memory and since most people tell small lies, the big lies are easier to believe especially when they are repeated often. As I said in my previous post the next event is Iraq. Just like the Serbs of WWII, the Iraqis Western surrogate war against Muslim Fundamentalism from Iran is forgotten. The old saying that “there is no honor among thieves” applies well to NATO leadership.
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 12:52 pm
  George I note your name from before --good idea. Do you know that the discussion on the trial has been frozen for many months now.. It needs reopening. I mailed the BBC but got no reply. Maybe Orwell's ghost is still working there.
  
  Julian Rochell
  Norway

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 12:53 pm
  discussion on the BBC, that is
  
  Julian rochell
  norway

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 2:19 pm
  First of all. Excellent forum. Love to read the posts. A Roy Gatman from Newsweek was on PBS this week. When I turned it on he was talking about Bosnia and how horrified he was to see that people were being murdered in concentration camps only because of their religion. He was saying that everyone was ignoring crimes in Croatia, where most people thought the Croatians deserved it for what they had done to the Serbs in the second world war. I gathered that he was against Serbs there too.Gatman would be doing the world a favor if he camped over in the Middle East and reported what was going on there. How long are they going to keep pointing at the Serbs? How about the movies where all the terrorists are Serbs. Muslims are not portrayed as such. The lies never stop. Who is behind this?
  
  Kathryn Love
  SJC
  USA

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 2:41 pm
  I would rather say what's behind this: a big deal of stupidity (also).
  
  Serjoe B
  Italy

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 5:33 pm
  If the ICC isn't going to address NATO guilt for Kosovo, then, and if anything our military people do overseas is going to require battalions of lawyers to defend them, there's no reason we should keep our forces in Kosovo either ...
  unless/except it is to protect the mafias' drug and prostitution businesses ... which are booming.
  For an inside look on just how deep drugs and organized crime have gotten into American society, look at the video OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE: THE MENA CONNECTION. (It was recently successfully defended from libel accusations.)
  During Bush1's presidential and Clinton's Arkansas governor administrations, this was a principal drug route into the U.S., protected by local and state law enforcement officials, according to the video. 2 local teenage boys came upon a drug drop and were murdered. The video is about their parents and a lady prosecutor -- who had to be given sanctuary/protection by the FBI -- who tried to find out what happened and who murdered their sons.
  Bush2 had promised that the Patriot Act's anti-terror provisions would be used against drug pushers and organized crime. Asa Hutchison -- the well-respected Arkansas Republican Congressman who was one of the impeachment prosecutors -- was made the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, and he obviously knows all about Mena ... but he has done nothing.
  Does the media and Lieberman/Clinton/et-al now have Bush -- with Enron, the FBI/CIA/Sep.11 scandal, and now re-raised accusations about his own stock dealings -- to the extent that he's intimidated from going after the mafias' (Kosovo) crime operations ... there and over here?
  With all the corruption and crime over here, it's like Saigon USA.
  
  Lou Coatney
  Macomb
  Illinois USA

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 7:53 pm
  Judge May (NATO) often does what no defence council would ever dare, to ask the direct question: "was NATO ploting the destruction of Yugoslavia?" or "did you see anyone pouring blood or another liquid by the corpses while you were taking the photographs?" or "have you talked with any member of the prosecution?". Inevitably you know what the answer to all these questions will be. The art is to bring the witness to give the information wanted without him of her knowing. I think, Mr. Milosevic should say to judge May(NATO) : "thank you i gospodin May for taken over my defence, but please make sure you win my case"
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Saturday July 06, 2002 at 9:32 pm
  Milosevic prosecutors drop some charges http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=06072002-033133-1469r Bravo Slobo, bravo!
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Sunday July 07, 2002 at 11:22 am
  It's been mentioned here how difficult it is sometimes to read long posts that have no paragraphs. I just copied Gogol Charlemagne's post into Word and it showed paragraphs. Tried the same thing with another post and it did not. Would posters be willing to try inserting a paragraph mark into long posts so that the post could be copied and paragraphs inserted using 'Search & Replace' for readers who want to do it? I'd suggest a sign like ### or even PARA.
  
  Nikole J
  Canada

• Sunday July 07, 2002 at 12:18 pm
  Sandra Mitchell must have headed for the nearest WC as soon as she completed her testimony. I am not sure how many of you noticed that every time she was cornered by Milosevic and she was circumventing his questions she would reach for the glass of water. She must have drunk a gallon of water in the time that she gave evidence. She seemed only thirsty when she was uncomfortable with the question and when seemed to be less than truthful. Milosevic asked her about some 200 gravesites that she had documented throughout Kosovo and if she had verified how the persons died; she went into a ‘cock and bull” story attempting to circumvent the question but was forced in the end to say that she had no idea how these people died. (She drank half a glass of water after that encounter). She was also asked about her book in which she speaks of 100,000 dead Albanians during the Serbian presence in Kosovo, just before the NATO bombing and now she speaks only of some 2000 bodies. The discrepancy is lost on Mr. May as he interrupts and a valid point is lost in the judge’s medaling. Mitchell also admits that she did not report the reasons for Serbian population fleeing Kosovo prior to NATO bombing. So to her only the Albanian reasons for fleeing are valid. Locally I volunteer as court interpreter for many persons from former Yugoslavia. The last group, some six families from Kosovo of Muslim faith. I have had many opportunities to speak to them about their experiences in Kosovo. Every one of them told me that they had sent their women and children out of Kosovo to Serbia to live with relatives just prior to the bombing. The men stayed behind to look after their homes so that they would not be looted. The ones that fled were mostly those that could not speak Albanian. For non Albanian speakers it became dangerous to stay behind
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Monday July 08, 2002 at 12:41 am
  The "testimonies" of Albanian "witnesses" and "experts" regarding "mass killings" would be so much fun to dissect if it was not in the context of political prostitution of the legal profession. ########### Throughout NATO’s bombing campaign the most often used words in the Western media were “mass graves” and “atrocities.” The much-heralded six-digit number by Cohen in April 1999 gradually yielded to a mere 2,000, but not before generating a considerable public support in the West. In reality, the disparity between public relations numbers and the real body count on the ground has been stunning. Most of the alleged “mass graves” turned out to be individual ones, and those that contained at least three bodies reveived further exposure in the media, emphasizing their “mass” nature. The media, in a characteristic fashion lumped all the vitims together and inflated the numbers in its reports throughout the year, starting with the alleged 100,000 at the commencement of the air strikes, and eventually settling for what they managed to document with the help of hundreds of foreign forensic specialists after June 1999. (See Jared Israel's excellent summary on the case of the Spanish forensic team in Istok - also El Pais, September 23, 1999).########## The total number of the bodies exhumed in the aftermath of the NATO war amounted to only over 2,000, and that is in a region subjected to 17 months of civil war and over three months of NATO air strikes. They included KLA militants killed in combat, Albanian civilians caught in hostilities, Albanian and Serbian civilians killed by the bombing, suspected KLA members executed by Serbian paramilitary units and police, Serbian and Albanian victims of the KLA terror before the air war, and the tally of the KLA infighting. ########### Most dramatized accounts did not make sense even as the war was going on in 1999. #################### On April 19, 1999, the New York Times came up with a highly publicized effort of pinning new “mass graves” allegation on Serbs, displaying Aerial Photographs of Mass Graves in Izbica, Kosovo (U.S. Official Calls Tallies). However, the photographs released by NATO the previous Saturday showed individual graves, not mass ones. Besides, the photograph on the left (with no graves), taken presumably before the burials, exhibited abundant foliage of the nearby woods, as shown on the aerial photograph. By contrast, the right one, with the graves, taken presumably after the graves showed up, shows a bare forest, with no or little foliage. Assuming that it was springtime in Kosovo, the odd sequence of pictures invites speculation regarding possible, and rather ham-fisted at that, doctoring of aerial photos for public relations gain. ################### On June 23, 1999 The New York Times published a dramatized account of Serbian troops allegedly having exhumed the bodies of over 100 people from a mass grave near Djakovica and transporting them away, ostensibly to cover up a massacre. Basing the story entirely on the account of one Faton Polloshka, director of the city’s sanitation department and an ethnic Albanian, the paper gave an account of some 100 people murdered on May 14, 1999, buried, and exhumed on May 22. Polloshka, who, according to the report, had been in charge of sanitation works of the town since 1985, had managed to keep a record of the names and occupations of the 140 other people buried by his teams since the start of the war on March 24, 1999. Regretfully enough, and in spite of being a native and a lifelong resident of the town, Polloshka had said “that he still could not get the names of the roughly 100 people who were killed in early May.” To make up for the absence of the bodies of the allegedly murdered residents, a visual effect was brought forth: “On a piece of red plastic, someone had placed six pieces of human bones, apparently found in the area.” The zeal of producing a dramatic effect in this case yet again ran contrary to the fundamentals of common sense and basic tenets of physiology: as any forensic expert, - hundreds of whom were being deployed in Kosovo by the time the story appeared, - could have told the investigators that a human body does not decompose so rapidly as to result in white bones in a mere five weeks.######################## During the air war NATO claimed that the Serb forces had dumped some of the countless thousands of slaughtered Albanian civilians into the Trepca mine. The story was a sure attention-getter for a while: “Trepca-the name will live alongside those of Belsen, Auschwitz and Treblinka,” trumpeted Daily Mirror. The NewYork Times claimed at the time that the residents on the edge of the mine reported an “unusual, pungent bittersweet smell, which they assumed to be burning bodies.” "Billowing white smoke" had been allegedly seen over the site where the bodies were presumably burned - inviting an Aschwitz simile. No Holocaust expert ("I know a Holocaust when I see one") stepped forward to remind the pie-eyed zealots that the smoke from burning human bodies is actually BLACK, not white. In another version of the same horror story the corpses were supposedly thrown down the shafts, or were disposed of entirely in the mine’s huge vats of hydrochloric acid. On October 12, 1999 Kelly Moore, a spokeswoman for the Hague war crimes tribunal had to admit that the investigators had found “absolutely nothing” at Trepca. Rather than 1,000 bodies down the mine shafts, there were none at all; and the vats had never been used to dispose of human remains. Shortly afterward, writes Gwyn, the tribunal reported on its work at the most infamous of all the mass graves of ethnic Albanians, at Ljubenic near the town of Pec. NATO officials had claimed that 350 victims had been hastily buried there by the retreating Serbs; five bodies were actually found, As Gwyn pointed out: So far, not one mass grave has been found in Kosovo, despite active search by forensic teams, including experts from the FBI and the RCMP. The official admission notwithstanding, on October 31, 1999 the New York Times was still using the “10,000 deaths” figure. Gwyn’s conclusions were final and categorical: There was no genocide of ethnic Albanians by Serbs, no “human catastrophe,” and no “modern-day Holocaust.” There was only a grotesque lie concocted to justify a war that NATO originally assumed would be over in a day or two. . . . No genocide means no justification for a war inflicted by NATO on a sovereign nation.” ############# P.S. Is Roy Gutman STILL around? Good God, the guy has been totally discredited by the massive inquisitive efforts of Thomas Deichmann (See also the Trnopolje "concentration camp" forgery by the ITN.)
  
  Andre Huzsvai
  Boston
  U.S.

• Monday July 08, 2002 at 6:54 am
  Alan Paton, the Soutch African writer, author of "Cry, the Beloved Country" said in his correspondence something I will never forget. - Well, actually I have forgotten what he said, but it went something like this: "No matter how much heat you get, don't get paranoid. Or , as has been suggested earlier in this forum, there may be fewer conspiracies here than one thinks. - Someone said beautifully of the conspiracy theories: there is one element in human behaviour that the conspiracy theories don't take into account, that is the fact that people screw up. - To show how much of the war crimes issues can be traced to human frailty is shown, I think, in the case of Pierre-Richard Prosper, the US ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues. How precarious his post was to begin with can be checked in an old article: http://www.nchr.org/resources/prosper.htm . It wasn't even certain whether George W. Bush would OK such a post. Incredibly, Mr Prosper, "while at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, oversaw the prosecution of the case of Jean-Paul Akayesu, the first official ever to be convicted for genocide". Yet Mr Prosper is remembered for his statement that the ICTY should end its activities. Not only that, he was the one who had to explain that the US isn't joining the ICC. - What is happening here? No matter what is happening, this is an opportunity. The Bush administration hasn't sorted out its war crimes policy, and now is the time to influence the decision-making. The present inconsistencies are evident to everybody, and they have to be rectified. The US will have to answer for its withdrawal from the ICC Statute, and it will be easier if the US policy is consistent. - Besides, if Mr Prosper can make such remarks about the ending the activities of the ICTY, he seems to have a say in the matter. I would be very willing to continue presenting legal arguments, but the Krstic judgement shows that it is no use. - The problem has to be tackled politically. Just let's make sure that we don't interfere with the tribunal's work, because some people still respect what it is doing. However, the results of the UN identification projects cannot be the exclusive property of the ICTY prosecution. Also, the track record of some of the staff, notably of the prosecution, is of general interest, especially to those who are financing the tribunal, i.e. the US. - The U.S. funding is the key. Cutting or suspending the funding wouldn't technically be interfering with the tribunal's work. It is the U.S. taxpayers' money, and the ICTY doesn't decide how it should be spent. - Mr Szamuely's comments were very encouraging. I will also do what I can outside this discussion. Make this part of your "jihad" (in the sense of the Harvard commencement speech). Whatever you do, do what you do best.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Monday July 08, 2002 at 7:08 am
  Some promising signs from the political right again, like this column: http://www.townhall.com/columnists/stevechapman/
  sc20020708.shtml .
  
  J N
  Finland

• Monday July 08, 2002 at 7:17 am
  Or does that just show how undecided the opinion-makers are getting?
  
  J N
  Finland

• Monday July 08, 2002 at 7:53 am
  Even better news here: Balkans tribunal turns to Clinton By Jeffrey T. Kuhner THE WASHINGTON TIMES ZAGREB, Croatia - The Balkans war crimes tribunal is examining whether charges are warranted against former President Clinton and his aides for supporting a 1995 military offensive by Croatia that recaptured territory then held by rebel Serbian forces. Read the rest at http://www.washtimes.com/world/20020708-3102700.htm Charges will never be warranted but the fact that these things are appearing in nespapers is already something. Eventually the truth will come out.
  
  Peter Varavejke
  Belgium

• Monday July 08, 2002 at 7:59 am
  Snip from the WT article: "The United States provided military and technical assistance to Operation Storm in order to deliver a defeat to then-Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic's goal of forging an ethnically pure "Greater Serbia."" Old propaganda habbits are however hard to let go.
  
  Peter Varavejke
  Belgium

• Monday July 08, 2002 at 11:13 am
  For a broader historical view of the link between the Big Interests and the government in the US, which probably can account for a good deal of what has happened in the Balkans, see a recently published book “Wealth and Democracy” by Kevin Philips. Mr. Philips is a Republican, and has been a frequent commentator on the National Public Radio.
  
  D. W.
  US

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 3:14 am
  Steve Chapman's article is very interesting, because it is so ambivalent. Sure, you get the old propaganda cliches, but it is interesting how the argument is built. The column opens with a description of the Serb-inflicted horrors. They supposedly justified the U.S.-led bombing campaign. However, the writer admits: "The surprise is that the alleged war crimes were committed by the United States." But how does the description of the Serb-inflicted horrors fit the picture? Was it not the war crimes allegedly committed by the Serbs that justified the U.S.-committed war crimes? Now that the U.S. commentators are sure that the U.S. citizens won't be prosecuted in the ICC, they can admit that "maybe" the U.S. committed war crimes. It is interesting that these war crimes are committed "as legitimate acts of self-defense", which obviously doesn't apply to the Kosovo war. I don't know if the writer is speaking tongue in cheek or what. He says: "Imprecise laws are an invitation to prosecutions based more on political disagreements than on real abuses". Can't he see the connection with the Milosevic case he mentioned in the beginning? - Anyway, now that the ICC is off the back, the U.S. should let the ICTY crutch go. The U.S. doesn't have to use the ICTY to show that what it did was in the interests of "peace and human rights". Does the U.S have to make Serbia small to appear big? The U.S. is big, and its ICC decision shows that. The ICTY debacle is only going to tarnish its image. If the U.S. says that what it did was right, it has all the might to make it right. It doesn't need the perverse interpretation of international law to justify its actions. - Iraq has been mentioned a few times in this discussion. I am dead against the plans to attack Iraq. Iraq is a sovereign country, and this time Iraq hasn't attacked its neighbours. But suppose the U.S. attacks Iraq. Why will it do it? The Bush administration will think of a good reason. But I am pretty certain that even George W. Bush would make the mistake of claiming that the objective was to deliver Saddam Hussein to the ICC or whatever tribunal the U.S. can concoct. Who would buy it? Certainly not the ICC. So let the U.S. go, if they will let others go. - It is ultimately up to what one wants. Does one want to humiliate America? If so, one should keep quiet, because the ICTY will be a gigantic humiliation for the U.S. Does one want justice? Then the same law should apply to all. The Americans can't say that international law doesn't apply to them, because it is their task to make sure that others observe international law. Instead, they should admit that war is always an anomalous situation. War is in itself a violation of international law. If you want justice in such an anomalous situation, you shouldn't prosecute others for the things you committed too. If you excuse yourself, justice requires you should excuse others too. Winning doesn't mean that justice was on your side. The attempt to justify your actions by setting up more or less implausible tribunals is only going to damage your own legal system in the end. - The U.S. funding is the key. The ICTY shouldn't decide how the American taxpayers' money is spent. There is an interesting side-bar to the ICTY funding. It is unacceptable, from every angle, that the U.S. is told by the ICTY whether to give the aid to the Serbs or not. The chief prosecutor's fumbling makes this situation intolerable. If you're not willing to cut the funding to the ICTY, at least be fair and don't let the ICTY cut your funding to the Serbs. - It was certainly good news that Gen. Gotovina is making waves. The Croatian World Congress stressed that "the most just outcome would be to withdraw the indictment against Gen. Gotovina." That sounds curiously familiar, doesn't it? If the indictment isn't withdrawn, "American officials should be prosecuted in the interests of 'evenhanded justice'". I agree. Just be consistent. What does "evenhanded justice" ultimately require?
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 3:43 am
  From one of my other JURIST discussions, I got these tips: if you insert the letter "P" in angle brackets (less than and greater than) you can begin a new Paragraph. "I" will begin Italics and "/I" (both in angle brackets) will end italics. Similarly use "B" and "/B" for Bold print. Courtesy Mr Kopelman.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 5:06 am
  Pravda is saying the same thing about Carla Del Ponte's failing strategy as we have on this forum. http://english.pravda.ru/main/2001/07/06/9449.html . Pravda also published a letter explaining the U.S negative decision on joining the ICC. This shows how much sympathy the U.S. would have if it just let drop the ICTY.

  We knew that Carla del Ponte was desperate, but no-one knew how desperate, before she started threatening the U.S. in the Gotovina case. Before she saw her career prospects threatened by the U.S. rejection of the ICC. She made a mistake. If you are OK with the U.S. cutting funding to the ICTY, you couldn't have waited for a better moment than this to convince the Bush administration of the advisability of such a move.
  
  J N
  Finland

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 8:10 am
  IWPR also has to confess that the prosecution is desperate:

  Former Serbian secret police head Jovica Stanisic is at the centre of a desperate prosecution attempt to gather evidence against Slobodan Milosevic

  From http://www.iwpr.net/index.pl?archive/tri/tri_271_8_eng.txt

  Prosecution witness K25 in cross examination is providing Milosevic with a free pass home. The prosecutions case is crumbling fast.
  
  Peter Varavejke
  Belgium

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 9:07 am
  It is interesting that Washington Post article states that “United States must protect its citizens from a court that would not observe such basic rights as trial by a jury of one’s peers, protection from double jeopardy, and the right to confront one’s accusers.” The article gives this as a reason America should be exempt from the rules of the new ICC and yet it supports and finances add hoc tribunals for others. The example in question is the ICTY. This tribunal as far as I can see is a lynching, a political tool of NATO, and the very thing Washington Post object to in this article. *** Some Americans of today see themselves as “kulture tragen” or culture carriers in the same way as some Britons saw themselves in the 19th century and some Germans and Japanese saw themselves in the 20th century. Americans see themselves as a bastion of democracy and above the rabble of the other continents. They believe that they saved the world for democracy after both WWI and WWII. Therefore, they see it as their right to make rules for others because “Father Knows Best”. *** The media tells the American public that their cause is just. Cecil Rhodes at the end of the 19th century believed that if he could colonize the moon he would and in the end the world would be a better place. The same kind of thinking expressed recently by British Prime Minister Blair and the new boss of NATO, Robinson.*** In the 20th century most Europeans and others saw America as the protector of democracy. Our grandfathers, elderly uncles and other relatives came back from America with pockets full of money and we saw through them the land of “milk and honey”. Very few of us asked them how they earned that money. We felt that the streets in America were paved with gold. In reality we did not see that they earned this through backbreaking work in mines, forests and sweatshops. When they attempted to improve their working conditions by forming unions or speaking out they were seen as enemy aliens and told that “No goddamn “DP” is going to tell us how to run our affairs” or they were told to “go back where they came from” or were gathered by the FBI and deported. In order to become good citizens and accepted and not on the next boat back to where you came from they learned to be silent Americans. *** The herd mentality “cheerleading” has become a way of life in America particularly when America is under attack or when America does to others what they would consider a crime if it was done to them. The media and those who parrot Pentagon’s policies exclude the common man. The political process excludes the common man. Common man has no opportunity to change the status quo since the rules are stacked against any political alternatives. Over 50% of Americans refuse to vote because they are not represented by the policies of the Democrats or the Republicans. If the economy is not doing well this silent 50% might start marching in the streets. To keep them silent the government has food stamps and welfare programs for those in dire need. To keep others employed NATO needs wars. To save NATO, Yugoslavia was invented, terrorism sold by the media and now Iraq is on the plate. War and conflict is a form of diversion from scandals as well as the grease of the economy. At present the American economy needs diversion and more grease. I am appalled and angry that Americans will let Bush attack Iraq*** So you might ask what my point is. The point is that many Americans are conditioned to think that they will save the world for democracy. This thinking comes from John Wayne movies, the Red Scare, and the propaganda of the Cold War where issues were clear and justice was on American side. Very few Americans understand Canada, much less the Balkans. Unfortunately America has lost the moral imperative to be the leader of Western Civilization. The UN and its leader Kofi Annan, America’s “Uncle Tom” has become just as impotent where world justice is concerned.
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 2:34 pm
  Wolfgang Petritsch's appearance to attempt to refute Appendix B shows NATO/ICTY's desperation. His claim that the same was in the Dayton Treaty is obviously false. (See the 25May99 posting on H-Diplo by Peter Winters.)
  And Henry Kissinger himself cited Rambouillet being an ultimatum, not a treaty, in his 31May99 NEWSWEEK article. (I think the specific quote is in the archived discussion above.)
  The finger is ... inexorably ... pointing ... back.
  
  Lou Coatney
  Macomb
  Illinois USA

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 3:19 pm
  

  Jari -- I thought that had been tried before. It's HTML and it would be great if everybody used it but I don't think we can expect that. The next sentence will be a new paragraph; let's see if it works. If it doesn't, I still suggest using a couple of ### to denote new paragraphs in text.

  This is the test paragraph.

  
  
  Nikole J
  Canada

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 3:24 pm
  Sorry -- why didn't I think of it -- just put in a
  for a line break. Two of them will give you a paragraph. Please -- it's not too hard to remember and will make text easier to understand.
  
  Nikole J
  Canada

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 5:29 pm
  “The Pea Souper or Fog of War” Directed by the ICTY and Produced by Nato. Now showing at The Hague.

  In his guest appearance Klaus Naumannn referred to “ … this famous cat which is walking on a pot of hot soup.”. Pea soup, I presume, dished up by Carla del Ponte and flavoured by Judge May. See transcript for 14 June, page 7079. Much of Naumannn’s testimony boils down to Nato’s opinion that Milosevic used disproportionate force in combating the incursion of an Islamic terrorist force into the Serbian province of Kosovo. Opening up another can of soup (worms variety) Naumann claimed that the use of tanks and the shelling of KLA positions were disproportionate and thus justified Nato’s aerial bombardment and the indictment of Milosevic for war crimes.

  Serbian security forces were faced with KLA attacks including mortar bombs, RPG’s, heavy machine guns and mines not to mention the threat of a Nato invasion in 1998/99. Citizens of Kosovo were being arbitrarily murdered and abducted in the most horrific manner as exemplified in the Klecka massacre. Klecka unlike Racak was an event unknown by Naumann he claimed. Also he could shed no light on Nato’s claims of the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Kosovars: Porkies again? So this deployment of tanks and artillery by Serbian security forces, facing among others Mujahedeen and al-Qaeda, warranted a ‘proportionate’ attack by Nato: A 78 day aerial bombardment of 20,000 tons of bombs? Doesn’t the illogicality of it all make you want to scream with laughter: Isn’t it just the greatest farce? Flying bombs into public buildings: Dropping dumb and inaccurate Cluster Bombs from three miles high onto civilian areas; decapitating priests, taking off the arms and legs of innocent women and children, destroying hospital wards, schools and housing estates. Not to mention the odd refugee convoy, bus, train or otherwise vehicle mounted bridge. Depleted uranium ammunition and mines sowed by defective cluster bomblets litter Serbia. Much of Serbia’s infrastructure has been destroyed. At the height of the bombing Blair threatened that the attacks would go on until Milosevic ceded to the occupation of Serbia: There was to be no limit to his murderous attack whose purpose had degenerated into the credibility of Nato. Who put at risk the credibility of Nato and how many innocents had to die for this needless mistake; what more evidence of war crimes does the ICTY need? Subsequently Nato, having agreed to disarm them, stood by while the KLA and its variants ethnically cleansed Kosovo, murdering thousands in the process. This then is General Klaus Naumann’s concept of a proportionate response? And he had the cheek during the previous day’s hearing to question the soundness of mind of Milosevic?

  One, just one, co-ordinated hit, albeit a huge one, by Islamic terrorists on the USA and the coalition sails half way round the world to wreak its ‘proportionate’ response, and not only with tanks and artillery. Aid convoys, wedding parties, Red Cross food depots or any group given the slightest uninvestigated pretext is massacred with Daisy Cutters, Gun ships, B52’s and what you will. Rioting prisoners are bombed and shot like sitting ducks in situ even those bound at the wrists: No questions asked. Is the discrepancy so difficult to see? Britain and the USA supply arms to Israel who combat terror attacks in ‘proportionate’ responses not only with tanks and artillery but also F16 bombing raids: No questions asked. Is the discrepancy so very, very difficult to see?

  Entr’acte: When Milosevic legitimately tried to draw a comparison with Britain’s conflict with the IRA, in response to Naumann’s criticism of proportionality, Judge May intervened with the pomposity that only inferiority can bestow “Irrelevant. Lets move on” he barked for the umpteenth time. “Everything is irrelevant.” Milosevic wryly observed. “Speed up. Slow down. Move on. Stop.” Judge May drives Slobodan along like a donkey. Nazi show trial judges would admire his style.

  In the Balkans identified Islamic terrorist leaders are not pursued by Nato despite continuing acts of terror. Yesterday the magazine Ananova reported that Abu Qatada, Bin Ladens’s ambassador in Europe, is being afforded protection in Britain. Something stinks. Yes it’s definitely the pea soup served up by Carla. Perhaps when Naumann’s famous mad cat is not walking on a pot of hot soup he goes among the peas and leeks. Nato won’t let any of these thugs near the ICTY for fear of spilling the beans. If Milosevic is not guilty for this calamity then Nato and it’s Islamic terrorist allies, the KLA must be. Open and shut case. Surely modern law, let alone justice, is about reason and consistency.

  The Mikado is not half as funny: Enjoy “Pea Souper” while you can. This never to be repeated classic is ending in 2008 due to lack of funds. Nato just can’t afford to maintain this quality of justice. Hammer of the Serbs: In the meantime, for an even bigger sidesplitting event, don’t miss the unveiling of Tony Blair’s statue in Pristina later this summer.
  
  Peter Taylor
  Herts/UK

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 5:38 pm
  K25 could not be more welcome for Mr. Milosevic defence. It is inconceivable that prosecutor Mr. Nice (NATO) would have spent so much time on a witness which had all in Mr. Milosevic favour.

  Then ofcourse Mr. Nice (NATO) tried to stop Mr. Milosevic cross-examination by saying he had already cover the statement which under rule 92 bis this farcical trial is mostly conducted. A relaxed judge May (NATO) ruled Mr. Milosevic can continue for another hour with K25 who sings Mr. Milosevic tunes like a charm.

  "Did you see any one maltreating Albanians civilians?" he asked, "No, I did not"
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 5:38 pm
  Jari: thanks for sussing out the formatting instructions and for passing them on.
  
  Peter Taylor
  Herts/UK

• Tuesday July 09, 2002 at 6:38 pm
  Jari thank you for the legal interpretation. Excuse my ignorance. What is Rule 92 bis???
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  Canada

• Wednesday July 10, 2002 at 3:06 am
  I think it refers to the tribunal's rules of procedure and evidence, which can be viewed at the ICTY's website at http://www.un.org/icty/basic/rpe/IT32_rev22.htm#92bis . Rule 92 bis says: "A Trial Chamber may admit, in whole or in part, the evidence of a witness in the form of a written statement in lieu of oral testimony..." This the prosecution has had to do, because they don't have time for oral testimonies!

  The Gotovina case is very promising. The last time we heard of him, he was threatening to reveal the American plans behind the Croatian offensive. Florence Hartmann of the OTP denied such allegations. Now she admits there is an ongoing investigation. The line has hardened. If Gotovina keeps his promise, he could well shed light on what happened in the "safe havens", one of which was Srebrenica, the crux of Milosevic's Bosnia indictment. Del Ponte's Bosnia case is shaky, which is demonstrated by the fact that part of the charges have already been withdrawn, but Gotovina's revelations would deliver it a death blow. Well, Del Ponte may indict Nato, which would mean the de-funding of the tribunal. Nato leaders could stand trial, which would make this tribunal seem more legitimate in principle, but that is not likely to happen in practice. The international legal community has now a vivid demonstrations who badly things can go when you are prosecuting a head of state. What would happen if there were more than one former head of state in the same tribunal? No wonder the courts are now trying to avoid indicting key-figures of foreign governments. The problem is Milosevic, who thus seems to be the exception that confirms the rule.

  Suppose Carla Del Ponte is really planning to indict American politicians. There are plenty of reasons. The Bush Administration wouldn't let Richard Holbrooke testify without too many strings attached. Mr Prosper threatened to wrap up the tribunal, which means that the Bush Administration and the Prosecution may not be at very amiable terms. I think Colin Powell is visibly uncomfortable in Del Ponte's presence. He has every reason to be, because he doesn't want to be seen dithering at the same pace as Del Ponte, when the fate of the development of a foreign state is at stake. Carla Del Ponte is also trying to catch Karadzic and Mladic, and maybe she is blaming the Nato troops for the repeating failures. She could say: "Why didn't you start hunting them down earlier?" Now the Milosevic case is crumbling, and she may want to go down with style, leaving the indictment of Bill Clinton as her legacy. She may also be angry at the U.S. rejection of the ICC. She may think she is acting in the best interests of international law in venting her anger at the U.S. She may also be disappointed at her frustrated career prospect in the ICC. If she didn't plan a career at the ICC, why would she have been negotiating with the Chechen leaders some time ago?

  Big business may be involved in the Balkan imbroglio, but you mustn't exaggerate its role. Russia is run by the mob too, but that doesn't keep the Russians from attacking the ICTY. The Westerners may benefit from the Kosovo narcomafia. It has been said that America bombed Afghanistan to get the drug traffic going again after Taliban had shut it down. But the mujaheddin in the Balkans are a threat even from that perspective. Besides, I think the largest drug route in Europe goes through Bulgaria, which doesn't need terrorists to protect it. But I agree, the terrorists are an asset to the Western governments when some dirty work is needed. However, I think 9-11 was the terrrorists' payback time, not a Western plan.

  Talking about conspiracies, it is not too hard to think of one. For instance, after one has contacted the Bush Administration, warning of the danger of an indictment from the ICTY, one could contact the Croatian World Congress, congratulating it on its courage and vision, and after that contacting Carla Del Ponte, encouraging her to be "even-handed" and congratulating her on her toughening line on the U.S. However, sharing the plan with everybody wouldn't make it a conspiracy.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Wednesday July 10, 2002 at 7:23 am
  The evidence rendered in the form of written statement without cross-examination under rule 92 bis was the original plan of the prosecution. They would have had the posibility to bombard the court with hundreds of statements.

  Mr. Milosevic objected and demanded the right to cross-examine the witnesses behind the statements. This forced the court to limit the number of witnesses since as judgeMay (NATO) said:"the accused would have to begin his defence some time and since the prosecution's case has Kosovo, Bosnia and Croatia this may take place in a long time . . ."

  The trial's chamber position has been held by the apeal chamber.
  
  Golgol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Thursday July 11, 2002 at 4:33 am
  The "bis" indicates that rule 92 bis is one of those 20 or something amendments of the rules of procedure, which George Szamuely, who made a short appearance on this forum, mentioned in his article in New York Press at http://www.nypress.com/14/28/taki/bunker.cfm . It is interesting that the ICTY web site doesn't give us all the amendments, only the latest ones, so I couldn't find out even with a Google search when the rule 92 bis was added. At least we can be sure that it came handy for the prosecution. Somehow the prosecution thinks that the quantity of testimony eclipses its quality. I am glad Milosevic provided us with a sample of the level of the "evidence".

  I think if the tribunal used less of its time amending its own rules of procedure, it would have more time to keep up with the events in the courtroom and especially take a good look at the evidence. The former case law and the ongoing Milosevic trial indicate this hasn't been done. The rules of procedure hasn't been the only basic document that has been amended. The Statute has had to undergo the same treatment. You may say that the amendments to the Statute are inconsequential. Maybe they are, but that is the point. What would really need amending in the statute are the articles 1 to 8, where the provisions concerning the crimes and individual responsibility are to be found. As it is, the statute offers the prosecution a carte blanche. Any words added to these articles would limit the prosecution's power, which is why it hasn't been done. On the contrary, the prosecution - and the judges - have trouble keeping inside the existing very lax articles: temporal jurisdiction is overstepped, the "superior" in Art. 7(3) is taken almost metaphorically, etc.

  Some solace is brought by the dissonance created by the multitude of cases. I believe Gotovina was the Croat who was said to be indicted to make the tribunal seem more even-handed in order to facilitate the transfer of Milosevic. He was indicted in June 2001 (but the trouble is that the indictment was "kept confidential" until July). Now let's see how much even-handedness the tribunal can take. What we see emerging is the same pattern that was anticipated by the 9-11 attacks: former associates of the U.S. start turning against it. Now Gotovina threatens to go public about the secrets, and the chief prosecutor is getting impatient with the U.S. What should she do with Gotovina? Withdraw the indictment? In that case the intended effect of even-handedness would be lost, although she has withdrawn some charges against Milosevic. Let him speak? That would mean the de-funding of the institution. You know, Del Ponte is not the only one who can get nervous. She could indict Clinton et al. as the last face-saving measure. Anyway, if Gotovina will speak, that would make Milosevic look good in Bosnia and Croatia. The reason Del Ponte hasn't withdrawn all these charges suggests that she is still undecided about Gotovina, and secondly, that she is not too happy about the Kosovo phase of the trial, and third, the "rule 92 bis" evidence wasn't so impressive that she would submit it to Milosevic's cross-examination instead of going after the nebulous Croatia and Bosnia charges.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Thursday July 11, 2002 at 3:33 pm
  The second of Edward Herman's articles on the 'trial' deals with the role of the media: "http://www.zmag.org/ZMag/articles/may02herman.htm" Good stuff.
  
  D S
  Netherlands

• Thursday July 11, 2002 at 3:36 pm
  The second of Edward Herman's articles on the 'trial' deals with the role of the media: "http://www.zmag.org/ZMag/articles/may02herman.htm" Good stuff.
  
  D S
  Netherlands

• Thursday July 11, 2002 at 6:46 pm
  Former Yugo President, Zoran Lilic, was forced onto a plane to the Netherlands to testify against Milosevic. The Belgrade government committed this act. (P) One wonders if the Serbian people are worth wasting their time on.
  
  Kathryn Love
  SJC
  USA

• Thursday July 11, 2002 at 7:09 pm
  Following the killing of the archidukes in Sarajevo 28 June, 1914 Austria about a mounth later demanded all kinds of legal intrussions into Serbia's sovereignty.

  Serbia unwillingly accepted all conditions but one: the deployment of Austrian military personel in Serbia. Refusal which lead to Austria's invasion of Serbia and, oh well, to a century of violence of unknwon proportions.

  There is something building up to this crisis now days, the ICTY failure, the ICC formidable obstacle, Yugoslavia adrift, EU-US antagonism, and above all this NATO expansion East encircling Russia.

  The World economy? Oh, no, Marx is dead, the newspapers tell us.
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Thursday July 11, 2002 at 7:53 pm
  Comparing NAZI courts with the ICTY, well here is one example:

  President: But tell me at last what connexion does that have with the question, who set the Reichstag on fire.

  Dimitrov: There is a connexion, Mr. President, a close connexion.

  Goebbels: Mr. President, I shall be only too glad to answer this question. A preliminary note. I have the impression that the defendant Dimitrov wants to make propaganda before the Court in favour of the Communist Party, respectively of the Social Democratic Party. I can give him an answer to that: I know what propaganda is and he need not try to overtax my patience with such questions; this is quite impossible.

  When we accused the Communist Party of being the instigator of the Reichstag fire, the continuous line from the Communist Party to the Social Democratic Party was immediately apparent; because we do not share the bourgeois viewpoint that there is a fundamental difference between the Social Democratic and the Communist Party - something which is confirmed by the German politics of fourteen years. For us there was a difference between these two organizations only in tactics, only in the pace, but not in the principles, nor in the basic positions. When, therefore, we accused Marxism in general and its most acute form - Communism, of intellectual instigation, and maybe even of practical implementation of the Reichstag fire, then this attitude by itself meant that our national task was to destroy, to wipe off the face of the earth the Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party.

  Dimitrov was aquitted

  http://www.marxists.org/reference/
  archive/dimitrov/works/1933/reich/ch06.htm
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Thursday July 11, 2002 at 8:13 pm
  link. After a day of fierce criticism from its closest allies, the Bush administration on Wednesday backed off demands for blanket immunity for U.S. peacekeepers from the court.
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 2:37 am
  I don't think the question whether Slobodan is receiving a "fair trial" is even relevant at this point. For the lies he has told over and over one should not have to put him on trial to determine his fate. He deserves death and nothing else. The world has yet to hear about the crimes that Serbs (allies of Russia) are capable of commiting. Soviet Union along with Serbia have played a major role in every major war that has taken place thus far starting from WW1, WW2, Cold War, and we will soon hear about Russia having distributed chemical and biological weapons to muslim terrorists and training them in eastern germany. Russia and Serbs have broken every peace treaty that they have ever signed. Any word that comes out of Slobodan Milloshevic during the trial is a pure "lie". Lying has always been a part of slavic culture. Only by immoral means and lies have they ever manipulated the world. Slobodan and his followers (which include about 99% of serbians and soviets) should pay for the crimes they commited willingly. Civilians in Serbia were just as guilty as the military and followers of slobodan...they supported and acted upon crimes against human beings for as long as they have lived. Slobodan is capable of worse crimes then Hitler during nazzi times. This would have been shown clearly had the US not intervened. Mass graves, prosecutions, rapes, burning of people alive, killings of little infants, cannot be forgiven and in any way forgotten by those who have suffered them. Justice shall be done. Slobodan is capable of lying, deceit, and pretention. Only death can quiet his primitve sense down. Serbs and Soviets will never feel remorse for their actions. Peace.
  
  Laura Lipsey
  Atlanta
  Ga

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 3:48 am
  The Dutch Srebrenica report shows that Israel armed the Serbs and the US the Muslims. And indeed, the US tried to kill Milosevic during the bombing. That was against the U.S. law, but that obviously doesn't mean that the U.S. breaks its own law. Even the intentional targeting of the civilians seems justified, because they were "just as guilty". Talk about violating treaties!

  On the other hand, it is encouraging that the perception is now that Milosevic is determining his own fate. As to the evidence, it seems it can only be rebutted by comparing him to Hitler. Besides, the Slavs may be more honest than one thinks, because they at least admit they are dishonest, whereas the Americans don't. And at least they know that the Soviet Union has collapsed and that the Croatians and the Bosnian Muslims are Slavs (which may in fact be a good point in destabilizing the Bosnia and Croatia charges).

  Despite the appearances, if the judges do their work properly, Milosevic's case looks very good. The question is whether they have the guts to subject themselves to the castigation as we have seen above. The Bush administration probably doesn't, if it has a choice.

  Despite the reports that some of the charges on Bosnia have been withdrawn, I can find only one indictment on Bosnia on the ICTY website, the "initial" one. Anyway, as we remember Richard Holbrooke saying, any one of the charges is enough to sentence him for life. Del Ponte doesn't need to exaggerate. If the mentality is what he have recently seen, she doesn't have to charge him at all. The number of charges doesn't determine the fate of this case. How many charges could we, for instance, lay on the trial and still not convince the most single-minded people?

  The tribunal is all about Milosevic now. I am not even certain what happened to the people that were indicted together with him on Kosovo. They appeared in The Hague, yes, but are they still there? Anyway, the impression that is created is that of even-handedness: indictees come streaming to the tribunal. We don't hear of them since.
  
  Jari Pekka
  Nousiainen

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 4:53 am
  I was quite stunned by the 'kidnapping' of Lilic yesterday. Looks like the prosecution is in dire need of an insider witness. Can somebody with knowledge of law explain me if it is common that witnessess are arrested, forced to the court and subsequently forced to testify? Is this done in national law in any country? What about international law? I'm wondering if they will detain him untill the Bosnia and Croatia part of the trial. This trial is getting very ugly!!
  
  Peter Varavejke
  Belgium

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 5:25 am
  Rule 90 bis of the Rules of Procedure (one of those "bis" rules again) creates the possibility of transferring "detained witnesses". However, these witnesses have to be already detained in Serbia. Either some trumped-up charges are needed - or another amendment to the Rules of Procedure. But then again, these charges have to be concocted before the tribunal wants the person as a witness, which may not have been the case here. This is a former Yugoslav President!
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 5:51 am
  I don't have any details of what is going on, so maybe it's better not say too much. Just remember how painstaking negotiations were needed to get Richard Holbrooke to testify (and I think it seems he won't). The easiest way out is to say that Lilic came voluntarily (but according to the Holbrooke analogy even that wouldn't be enough).

  I just noticed that the tribunal has a separate document "Practice Direction on procedure for the Proposal, Consideration of and Publication of Amendments to the Rules of Procedure and Evidence of the International Tribunal". As you may have guessed, this practice direction itself has already been amended. I counted the amendements made to the Rules so far: 23 (including some amendments that have been deleted by later amendments).
  
  J N
  Finland

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 6:57 am
  Florence Hartmann, Spokeswoman for the Office of the Prosecutor, made the following statement:

  The Chief Prosecutor strongly denies conducting any investigation against former President Clinton or any other US officials.

  Mrs Del Ponte firmly denies the Washington Times allegations published on July 8, 2002, suggesting she was investigating former President Clinton.

  On two occasions, the author of the article (Jeffrey T. Kuhner) called me in connection with the Gotovina’s case but none of what I said could suggest any possible investigation of US officials.

  With regard to the Gotovina’s indictment, I shall repeat again that the accused should be arrested and stand trial. The Tribunal is the only place where his guilt or innocence can be established.

  On another point, in relation to the Milosevic case, I wish to deny that the Office of the Prosecutor decided to withdraw the charge of genocide committed against Bosnian Croats. The indictment relating to the Bosnian section of the case has not been amended.
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 8:37 am
  I have been reading this webpage for some time now. It has been very interesting to read, how the opinion of majority of those who take part in this discussion differs from the opinion of the news articles published on the same website, and thus encouraging to see, that many people still think by their own brains, try tirelessly to come nearer to the truth, which is, usually, very hard, if not impossible, to grasp, and do not let themselves be affected by the onesided propaganda of the mainstream so called free media. However, the recent article by Ms. Lipsey is something that fully shows, that something is wrong in the current world, when opinions, that are racist and border on fascist, are by many people considered to be progressive, human and democratic, and ignorance of nearly all facts does not prevent one from being extremely radical and self assured in his or her views. I think that is partly also the result of systematic brainwashing of the simpler part of mankind by the current world media. Take for instance the assertion that lying has always been a part of Slavic culture. Where does that come from, on what is that based? Actually I am not sure whether the first person to say that same sentence was not Hitler. This is not only untrue, this is pure racism, and it suggests that Slavs are lesser as a race than the others. Sure, there are many Slavs who lie, there are many who do not, like it is with people in any country of the world. Also, how can one say, that Serbs are capable of commiting crimes? One might say some people in Serbia are, but certainly not Serbs as a whole. Then we would have to say, that e.g. Croats, Albanians, and earlier Germans, Japanese, and yes, Americans, among others, are capable of commiting the same crimes! Because what about e.g. Vietnam, Korea wars, and last but not least bombing of Yugoslavia, there were not atrocities commited by Americans? And the own assertion of Americans that they have been always on the side of truth, no matter how questionable this assertion is, does not make these crimes any lesser. An innocent child does not feel any difference between being burned alive by Serbian fire or American bomb. Killing and every kind of violence is never ever excusable by anything, or at least ought not to be. (And, speaking of children, how would any of us, if we lived in Yugoslavia, like to cradle our child every night for three months to the sound of bombs falling around? How would you explain it to the child, that it should not for the rest of its life look to the sky with horror, or that it should ever forget this nightmare?) Also I do not understand the sentence of Ms. Lipsey, that Soviet Union and Serbia have played major role in every major world war thus far. What is so bad about it? The important thing is that neither of these countries ever started any of these major wars mentioned. The agressor countries in both the World Wars are well known, and for the information of Ms. Lipsey, it was never Soviet Union or Serbia. Also, no matter how much inhumane we might consider Stalinist regime in Soviet Union to be, we must observe, that in defeating fascism Soviet Union paid bigger prize than all the other allied countries combined, and not to be grateful for this means disrespect of the millions and millions Soviets who fell in that battle. And, as to the Cold War, we could also argue whether it was started by communist expansionism after WW2, or by the wish to destroy communism on the part of some Western countries that dates back to the times of Bolshevik revolution in Russia. Obviously, Ms. Lipsey also has no idea, that Soviet Union or East Germany no longer exist, or that Croats or Bosnian Muslims are Slavs, too, but this was already pointed out by a reader before me. To close this, first I think that we have to agree, that in every nation there are wonderful people and awful, evil people, but that no nation is in any way above or below the others. I have lived a few years in the U.S., and also in Belgrade, and in Moscow, too, and my personal experience confirms this. Actually, I have known Serbs, in a whole, as very friendly, open, bohemian and tolerant people. Second, I think that it is nearly impossible to really know these days, whether Mr. Slobodan Milosevic is guilty or not. If the prosecution has a firm proof, that he has ever ordered killings of civilians, then he is guilty, and if not, he is innocent of what he is accused of in the Hague. But, until now, there is no trace of a proof like this, and I have no doubt that had the prosecution something of this kind, they would have come forward with it. On the other hand, it was not only Serbs alone who are said to have committed atrocities in the Yugoslavia and Kosovo conflicts, and there are also perfect proofs, who ordered bombing of Yugoslavia, mass killings of people from fifteen thousand feet in the air, including civilian targets, like bridges and Serbian Television building. And that there are no leaders of those countries and nations sitting on the bench of the accused in the Hague, is a good proof of what the world has come to today. And, finally, to answer the question about fair trial. I have been reading from time to time the transcripts from the Milosevic process, so I answer no. This is no fair trial, at least so far, this is a farce, which is best characterized by the article: The Judge as Prosecutor, at http://www.icdsm.org. Robert
  
  Robert Hayer
  France

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 9:17 am
  On Liars: Show me a man or woman who breathes and I will show you a liar. A major purpose of a court of justice is to discover the truth. The truth can usually be discovered by logical argument according to accepted principles. Forensic science is another powerful aid used by lawyers in the search for this truth. The ICTY is not a court of justice as many here have demonstrated. It does not conform to accepted principles of justice and its illogicality is evident. Also it hides forensic evidence such as that produced after the Racak massacre. The purpose of the ICTY is to pin the blame for the crimes against humanity, in the former Yugoslavia, on the Serbs in general and upon Mr Milosevic in particular. The Reason for this is so that Blair and his cronies can escape any responsibility for their crimes in the area.

  You believe that only the Serbs are liars: not true, all men are liars. You believe in summary execution (except when carried out by Serbs): so did the Nazis. So Ms Lipsey, what is your point? “Mass graves, prosecutions, rapes, burning of people alive, killings of little infants cannot be forgiven and in any way forgotten by those who have suffered them.”

  You are aware that of the exaggerated number of mass graves found in Kosovo most of them contain the bodies of Serbs? No court can hold a candle to the ICTY for one-sided prosecutions: no one from the KLA/KPC has ever been indicted by del Ponte. You want summary execution for the USA sergeant who raped and then strangled a little Albanian girl in Kosovo and the three British soldiers who gang raped a Danish visitor to Cyprus then beat her to death with a shovel? What are you going to do to those responsible for dropping Napalm on children in Vietnam? Or those who deliberately, it seems, attacked refugee convoys in Kosovo killing and injuring more than 200 including many children. Then there was the Serb bus convoy blown up last year by the KPC.

  Do you really believe that your tirade in favour of the KLA/KPC has even one ounce of credibility. Two days ago Stars and Stripes (Europe) reported: “Hamez Hajra and his family were driving on a road near Koder Village in the British sector of Kosovo on August 20, 2001. The family’s vehicle was stopped and gunmen then opened fire, killing the parents and three children - including a 9 year old. A sixteen year old was wounded and survived.” The report goes on to say that when the UN police arrested the suspects for this brutal slaughter of a Kosovar family the ethnic Albanian media waged a dishonest campaign of alleged brutality: falsely claiming, together with fake injuries, that a child was injured when a revolver was thrust into his mouth. The campaign went on to compare the UN police to the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. There is evidence that the KLA has been using these tactics on the Serb police for years. Blaming Serbs for their murders then claiming brutality when arrested for the crime. So much for your lying Serbs tirade.

  PS I see that you failed your history tests on the origins of WW1, WW2 and the Cold War.
  
  Peter Taylor
  Herts/UK

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 11:15 am
  Laura, While I am not Slaw, I am very concerned of your blank statement "that all Slavs are liars" do you mean something like the corporate America liers? in analogy this makes all Americans liers including you. I international politics "national interests" come first, FACTS and legal implications of some actions come after the fact. Moreover, appears that you are unfamiliar with the Balcans politics, as you are with the Slavic culture. As a Jew I lived (my family found refuge in the occupied kingdom of Yugoslavia) duiring the war, therefore I think that I have learned some aspects of Serbian culture.I could not claim any knowledge of other Slavs,including Russians. Granted that RSSR brocke some agreements, but so did the USA. My point is this: if two countries breack the international agreements or law, that does not exsonorate either, both are wrong and accountable. Otherwise, two wrongs do not make it right.( unlike in math, two negatives cancell each other and become posive number) Perhaps you could rethink your statement. Best, Carla
  
  Carla Berg
  Austria

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 12:20 pm
  Found an interesting article from the Washighton Post on the detainment of witnesses. It's in a different context as the Lilic case but a clear indication how the world and justice is changing.

  Judge: U.S. May Jail Material Witnesses

  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58450-2002Jul11.html
  
  Peter Varavejke
  Belgium

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 1:13 pm
  Carla, I'm surprised to see a female of a jewish background write what you have written given the history of jewish man, women, and children. I have just finished reading "Hitler's willing executioners" and every detail of it reminded me of serbian crimes committed which I have witnessed with my own eyes as a five year old kid. Slobodan commited teh same crimes just in a smaller scale...if given the chance he would have gone further with it. You will never understand teh mentality of serbians unless you have live with them for a long period of time that is. My father is of albanian ethnicity and my mother is of serbian national. I have lived in Belgrade, Kosova, Russia, Germany, and have since resided as a student in the USA. About 90% of my friends are jewish...so I'm well aware of the jewish history as well as their culture and I'm also aware where jewish hid during the war and it was not in serbia. I bet you did not know that albanians are the ones who protected the serbs and the jews against attrocities comitted by nazzis in the occupied kingdom of Yugoslavia. I have not only read a billion papers written by serbs, albanians, russians, but I have lived my life with them. I do not speak only from the history I have read, but from first hand experience. Sure corporate America lies...but woudl this be comparable in any scale to the crimes commited by nazzis or serbians (it's one thing...slobodan and hitler are of the same mentality?)? I'm apalled at how many people and expecially jewish people here are brainwashed the way they are. It's NOT racism I'm portraying as once writer has accused me of here...it's the reality I have witnessed. Everything you read does not come from a "legitimate" source. If you go to albanian websites serbs are the bad guys...if you visit the serbian sites albanains are the bad guys...you have to live it in order to understand it. I have to say I'm definitely taken by surprise to see so many peple here side with Slobodan, whom given the chance...would commit the same crimes and much worse than muslim terrorist do today. Serbs and Russians are even more dangerous because they're not uneducated and primitve people like the arable...it's quiet the contrary...they're so well educated and nice that it's easy for others to get fooled and not be able to accept their crimes as punishable and unforgiven. Many people here claim to have read, visited and known many people of serbian origin. Sure most of them are very well educated, are very outgoing, and know how to manipulate others including yourselves of their goodness. But trust me they would stab you in the back every chance they get. Albanian sure have many weaknesses but that's a direct link to the oppression they have suffered. Kids as early as the age of 7 were forced out of their schools...denied their mental and health care. What else would a person with no education but turn to violent means to obtain that which has been denied to them ever since tehy were born. Serbs treated albanians as "less then human" for as long as I remember just as nazzis did with jews. People that fought side by side with Slobodan were ordinary serbs just as people who murdered millions of jews were ordinary germans. The vast literature on teh war in Kosova contains little on the people who were its execuationers. And for sure no significant aspect of serbian culture was untouched by anti-albanian policy; from the economy, to society, to politics, to culture, to organizations, and teachers. No analysis of serbian society, no understanding or characterization of it, can be made without placing the attempted persecutions and extermination of the albanians at its center. Undertsanding the actions and mind-set of teh thousands of serbs who, liek slobodan, became genocidal killers is a hard task at hand unless having experienced it. Serbs extinguished the lives of many albanians and, had teh UN not intervened, would have annihilated thousands more. Deceit is a defining feature of serbian politics and political culture. I understand that many other govcerments operate teh same way...but serbian and russian one is a dangerous one. Their chief common denominator is that they are all serbs pursuing soviets national political goals - in thsi case teh genocidal killing on many minorities. Time will tell and show where the truth lies for those who have not found the truth as of yet. In no sense do I want to offend or made feel bad anyone on this forum...nor would I like to be taken as racist in any imaginable way....I'm simply expressing what I have witnessed in yugoslavia, in my mother, in my father, and many surrounding myself. I wish nothing else more then there to be peace amongst the many groups in ballkans. Many thanks.
  
  Laura Lipsey
  Atlanta
  Ga

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 2:14 pm
  Dear Laura Lipsey,

  Mr. Goldhaguen book is not an scholarly book in any sens of the imagination besides all its "foot notes".

  May I recommend Ordinary Men 1992, by Christopher R. Browning, from which Mr. Goldhaguen draws some of his conclusions?

  Sincerely,
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 3:24 pm
  Dear Laura It always take me by surprise to see how big and intransitive discrepancies among our two nations had grown. Given the fact that you are of interetnic background you should try to play a more constructive role in attempts to bring peace to Balkan, rather than spilling out poisonuos lies and untruths about whole nations. As a medical doctor I could give you rather interesting perspective of what is your letter teling me about your confused personality, complexes of minor value and selfhatred projected on somebody else. It is a potent mechanism of denial, but one that will eventualy fire back on you. But I will not, becouse you are probably just a troubled youth with extricated roots, trying to cope with the harsh reality of beeing expatriate and therefore having to put an excepcional effort in achieving things that were your birthwright. But dont put that effort to etnic hatred cause it is a vicious closed circle that will eventually explode leading to more serious consequences. As a Serbian however, I can not just stand and take the amount of misinformations (better word for lies), that you spilled over. As a 5 year old you witnessed serbian crimes which given the fact that you are a student now (let say arround 20 years old), puts them back in 1987. You should contact ICTY and stand as a witness on Milosevic trial. Your credibility is no worse than of other Albanian "witnesses" Thank you for revelation regarding Albanian role in saving Jews and Serbs in WWII. I bet that SS Wafen divizion "Skenderbeg" played a major role in it. You are not a rasist (even though slavs are not liars and Arabs are not primitive);You are a demagogue which is far more dangerous to you and your surrounding. Thank you all for an outstanding discussion.
  
  Miroslav Radulovic, M.D.
  NYC
  USA

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 3:57 pm
  Laura claims her Mother to be Serbian and her father an Albanian. /// In her earlier post she tells us that it is a Slav culture to lie. I wonder why she chose to be on her father’s side as an Albanian. Does she include her Mother as someone who has a penchant to lie?//// Does she include herself in this Slavic culture to lie? After all she is telling us she is half Serbian as she says her Mother is a Serbian Nationalist. /// I note that the UN is now dealing with the culture to lie in Kosovo, when the Albanian News Media are using propaganda against the UN. Seems the UN are being accused of shoving a rifle into the mouth of an infant when they arrested Albanians for the murders of a family of nine who were sympathetic to the Serbians. Now why, I ask myself, would Albanians be sympathetic to Serbians? Maybe it is because they did not believe all the lies against the Serbians.
  
  Kathryn Love
  SJC
  USA

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 5:02 pm
  I am not sure why my earlier post was omitted from this page. I wrote that Ms. Lipsey’s historical knowledge must come from Archie Bunker re-runs. If that is where she gets her history from I can understand the lack of knowledge and objectivity. Her emotive language displays her bias. She has not provided a shred of evidence in support of her assertions. She almost sounds like “The No Name” person who used to post on this page a month ago. A question was asked concerning appearance of witness at the Tribunal. Witnesses are not required to attend. Attendance is voluntary and as a result most witnesses that Milosevic would like to call will not show up and the Tribunal will not go after them like they did with Mr. Lilic. Many have already mentioned that the rules of evidence as I understand them here in Kamloops do not apply at this court. The limit on cross-examination, the constant interference by Mr. May, rule 92 bis that do not allow questioning of a witness who submitted evidence in a written submission go against the tradition of the rule of law and due process. In Canada a witness who is subpoenaed by the courts must appear on the date stipulated to testify. If they refuse, after they have been properly served, they can be arrested and charged with contempt of court which can result in jail time. There have been situations where political figures and those that have the money can circumvent such subpoenas. At times the golden rule applies. “Those that have the gold make the rules”. It is also true in this case those that have the power (USA) make rules for others but refuse to submit their own nationals to the same justice that they supposedly support. The issue of disproportional use of force, the idea that the Serbs used to much force is a smoke screen. Look at any insurrection or a protest the force is never proportional. Police at Kent State shoot four unarmed students; the British army in Ireland uses armored vehicles and water cannon against IRA and their supporters; the Canadian armed forces (helicopters and armor vehicles Oka, 100 Mile House incidents) are called out to deal with native roadblocks; American stealth bombers against Serbian TV stations and hospitals; police in Milan shoot an unarmed WTO protester; I could go on endlessly. The point is that no police force is going to act as if this is an Old West gunfight. Every nation uses disproportional force during war or insurrection and NATO is the best example of this disproportionality. One issue that this forum is not looked at deals with those that have been convicted by this Kangaroo Court. These that have been convicted will be serving their time in places like Spain, Finland or Norway. Basically these people are prisoners of war and I am sure most of us who post on this page feel that if they are guilty of the crimes that they have been accused of they need to serve the time. My issue here is justice. Nations that purport to subscribe to the rule of law should not break the law in order to implement their vision of New World Order. The big dog should not make all the rules. The other issue here is that these persons who have been convicted will continue to be denied justice because their sentences will be served in foreign lands. They will not be able to have visits from family members and this is a contravention of their rights. Some of you may feel that this is too bad but I would disagree with you since I feel that the justice in a society is measured by how it protects the rights of all its citizens even the ones in the penal systems who have very few rights.
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 7:22 pm
  Oh, now you're going to psychoanalyze me Dr. Radulovis? I see that it's the only way you can express the very "sub-human" points of view of albanians you hold dear to. I simply wrote the message above to improve knowledge of the past by providing a true acount and teh best interpretaion of teh war in Kosova and of the people who perpetrated it of which I am capable. To allow all people who wish to do so to derive meaning from the past by affording them the opportunity to confront this knowledge openly and honestly. I apologize for accusing you guys to be brainwashed...I believe you belong in trial with Slobodan (side-by-side). No reason for responsenor physchoanalysis of my message. It's the last one I will provide.
  
  Laura Lipsey
  Atlanta
  Ga/USA

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 8:51 pm
  Peter Mansbridge, the Walter Cronkite of Canadian TV News, interviewed Harvard Professor Alan Dershowitz and asked him about his views on military Tribunals.Dershowitz stated that he totally disagrees with tribunals as a method of providing justice. 1. Trial is not in front of a jury of peers. 2. Bias as it represents victors trying those that are defeated. 3. No appeal available. 4. Evidence is tainted. 5. Search for truth focuses on efficiency rather than law. 6. Evidence is pre-empted by national security. 7. Not a real court. 8. Does not following rule of law and due process. 9. Main objective is to exonerate the victors. 10. Therefore, victor’s justice more important than law. The fact that the ones who have been found guilty will be serving their sentences in foreign lands is contrary to International law seems not to bother the court. The Nazis served their sentences in Spandeau in Berlin, Why should those that this Kangaroo Court finds guilt be treated differently???????
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Friday July 12, 2002 at 11:32 pm
  You are right Walter.Its contrary to international law to serve time in a different country ,but in Milosevic case there are certain elements in the Serbian Gov.that want Milosevic out of Yugoslavia. On the other hand I think that the Hague tribunal should conduct its second part of the trial in Beograd. It will be fair justice. My feeling is that there are a lot of witnesses that will testify for defence , serb winesses that are afraid to go to Hague.Lets hear the other side of the story. Vasile
  
  Vasile Ianos
  NJ

• Saturday July 13, 2002 at 1:03 am
  Dear Laura, Here is my diagnosys:It's all your mothers (read Serbian)fault. We agree on this one; don't we? That would be $150. Thank you.
  
  Dr. Freud
  NYC
  USA

• Saturday July 13, 2002 at 3:38 am
  Laura, I think youm are ready form the funny farm. Such simple minded trash as you utter should not be on a sensible forum such as this.
  
  Julian Rochell
  norway

• Saturday July 13, 2002 at 9:31 am
  To Laura Lipsey: I am truly sorry that you have decided not post any more messages on this board. It is not often we are privileged with the presence of such a paragon of virtue who unlike all the ‘nasty Serbs including presumably your mother’, never tells a lie. You being a person of impeccable moral integrity and apparently infinite knowledge claiming to have direct experience, or at least contact with those who do, on these matters: I was hoping that you might shed some light on a couple of problems that still afflict the region:

  Steiner, Kosovo’s viceroy, recently declared that the abducted minorities in Kosovo, mainly Serbs, must be considered to have been murdered. Question 1 to she who never tells a lie: where are the bodies of these approximately 1500 people hidden and who murdered them?

  2. Why, after three years, have the 200,000 or so, minority population (mainly Serbs) expelled by the forces of the KLA/KPC not been allowed to return to their centuries old homeland and when will they be allowed to do so? I am so sorry that, being a person of your word ‘not to post again’, I shall be deprived of your self-proclaimed ‘honest and erudite’ illumination on these matters.
  
  Peter Taylor
  Herts/UK

• Saturday July 13, 2002 at 11:55 am
  An interesting article on the failure of the UN mission in Kosovo which Laura Lipsey may find to be a lie since the ombudsperson is Polish. The article from Reuter’s news services dated July 12th can be found at the following address. http://www.serbianna.com/news/07_11/03.shtml “A watchdog set up by Kosovo's United Nations administration has savaged its creator, warning that the Yugoslav province is in danger of becoming "a human rights black hole." Kosovo's Ombudsperson Institution, an independent body headed by a Polish lawyer, said in a report that the U.N. mission in Kosovo (UMNIK) neither respects fundamental human rights nor conforms to democratic principles.-----“ The UN must agree with the findings of the ombudsperson since his appointment to this institution has been extended for three years.
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Saturday July 13, 2002 at 2:33 pm
  Laura, do you think about the time when you were young and so 'oppressed'?

  Take a look here on those good old days!

  Articles written when Kosovo was not famous...

  Here:

  http://members.tripod.com/~sarant_2/ksm.html
  
  Aleks S.
  Germany

• Sunday July 14, 2002 at 8:22 pm
  I've just seen a report by Maggie O'Kane on BBC about arrest atempts of R.Karadzic in Bosnia. Her report starts with something like: "It took the September 11th for the American troops in Bosnia to start looking for Karadzich..." What in the world has September 11th to do with Radovan Karadzic? I know it doesn't have much to do with Milosevic trial, but it's somehow related. Afterall - it all belongs to the same show. How much $$ does a journalist get for a bombastic report on some current issue?? Greetings, R.Sharpthing Horseshoe Fraud, Inc.
  
  Rudy Sharpthing
  Bonn, Germany

• Monday July 15, 2002 at 1:39 am
  What does looking for Karadzic have to do with September 11?/// Immediately after the terrorists acts, our politicians and news media were asking the following question? “Why would the Muslims be upset with the United States? Look what we did for them in Kosovo and in Bosnia. We have nothing against Islam.” ////// As the hunt for Muslim terrorists continued it was necessary to stress over and over that this had nothing to do with Islam. Islam is a peaceful religion.// The bombing of Afghanistan, the rush to favor Israel in the Middle East is probably upsetting a lot of Muslims.So... what better to do then to show them that we are still on their side and we will capture Karadzic for them. I for one knew this would happen./// When the wedding party was bombed in Afghanistan, a report came out that the UN tore up Karadzic’s home. They knew he was not there so after how many years why now? Incredible. Does anyone really believe this is going to satisfy the Islamics?
  
  Kathryn Love
  USA

• Monday July 15, 2002 at 3:54 am
  That was a very good point. Many people would have forgotten about Karadzic by now if Nato hadn't started suddenly hunting him. I wonder why it is Karadzic, not Mladic, that they are after. Because Karadzic was a politician, not a general like Mladic? That shows how liberally the "commander responsibility" is now interpreted.

  Why was Lilic kidnapped? I think the prosecution has finally figured out who the Commander-in-Chief of the Yugoslav forces was: Lilic was Yugoslav President from 25 June 1993 to 1997. He will be a key witness in the Bosnia and Croatia trials. On the other hand, how many times we have heard the words "key witness"?. These words were used of Rugova, so let's hope Lilic at least will tell the truth, even if he is a Slav.

  It may be that the U.S. courts now allow detention of witnesses, but following the U.S. case law only shows how crazy the ICTY is. Firstly, the ICTY shouldn't be led by a recent U.S. court decision, when its own Rules of Procedure contradict such a decision. Secondly, the witnesses detained in the U.S. are not "transferred" to another country. In the ICTY, on the other hand, it is handy that the word "transfer" refers not only to the de facto extradition of the indictees but also to the witnesses. Thirdly, it is telling that Nato hardly took any measures to catch Karadzic and Mladic for years. Now the measures that it was expected to use back then are applied, not to indictees, many of whom come voluntarily, but to the witnesses - and in this case not just to any witness, but a former head of state, who is supposedly one of the good guys (which is suggested by the simple fact that he is one of the few Yugoslav politicians - Slavs - that have not been indicted). And fourthly, the Americans like to use the term "uncontrollable witnesses" to describe the status of their politicians. That shows once again the one-sidedness in this trial (if any evidence is needed any more).

  The lying corporate America may not be unrelated to the events in the Balkans. I don't know the details of the American scandals, but isn't Dick Cheney's Halliburton the same Halliburton that is connected to the Trans-Balkan oil pipeline, as suggested at http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/apr2002/oil-a29.shtml ? If you are into the Big Interests connection in the Balkans, here might be the explanation why the Bush Administration is doing nothing to sort out the mess. Even Albright would be ready to testify, as she has said she would, if the Bush Administration would let her, which it doesn't! If indeed "it is all about oil", it would also explain why the Russians are not afraid of attacking the ICTY. They are losing out in the Caspian oil war anyway.

  But this shows one funny thing about the tribunal. The U.S. attack Serbia under the Nato umbrella, even if its national interests were not threatened. As the bombing campaign drew on, the words "national interests" were heard more often. Now the "judicial phase" has begun. I agree with Dershowitz's points, but I would like to comment on point 9: "Main objective is to exonerate the victors". That may be the objective, but that may be not the result. This trial is not fair, and according to some it shouldn't, but it is fair to the extent that it is basically public. So we are using our rights by criticizing the trial, which may the only thing left of its fairness. But it is just this public character that is making it hard to exonerate the victor. The victor would have been better exonerated by just bombing and shutting up. What is this trial doing to the U.S. national interests?

  Lou has made frequently the comparison with Glasnost. There was one event that broke the camel's back and brought the whole empire down. This trial might be that straw for America. And its consequences might be just as profound, with all that is now happening in the world. America has too many enemies already, so it should make enemies out of its friends. Either America should let go of these kangaroo courts and keep out of the ICC or keep this kangaroo courts and join the ICC. I don't think it will survive any other way.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Monday July 15, 2002 at 12:25 pm
  Halliburton & Camp Bondsteel SeeURL: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/apr2002/oil-a29.shtml - 16k - 30 Apr 2002
  
  Kathryn Love
  SJC
  USA

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 3:59 am
  What is it that links Lilic to Milosevic, so that Lilic deserves the same treatment as Milosevic, even if he is a witness? Please take a look at the comprehensive list of Yugoslav political leaders at http://www.terra.es/personal2/monolith/fry.htm . What links Lilic to Milosevic? Not succession, strictly speaking, because there was an acting president - Bozovic - between them. What links them to each other is the party: SPS, the Socialist Party of Serbia. It will be a challenge to find an indicted political leader or a mistreated witness without the abbreviation SPS after his name. So, that explains the concocted command structures that the prosecution is drawing: the political party - they were each other's comrades.

  And to show how closely the corporate America is linked to the destinies of Yugoslavia, think back at Milan Panic. He was appointed the Yugoslav Prime Minister in 1992. Why hasn't he been indicted? Because he is an American citizen! How could he be an American citizen and the Yugoslav Prime Minister at the same time? Was it because Panic was a multi-millionaire, who the U.S. hoped would bring the American-style capitalism to Serbia? Take a look at the story of Panic at this URL on a German server: http://www.aikor.de/InterTribunal/doku/twcarr4.htm .

  The recent disruption shows a few things about this court. First, "Carla del Ponte cannot deny that her tribunal is biased and anti-Slavic". That is a direct quotation from the Pravda article (written by Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey) that I have referred to earlier. ( http://english.pravda.ru/main/2001/07/06/9449.html ). Now we hear it first-hand: keep the Slavs out. And now we understand which population group is missing in the tribunal judiciary: the Slavs. It would be a good idea to check the list of judges, if I could find it anywhere. On the other hand, there is at least one Greek (if you want to find citizens of countries which are considered more sympathetic to the Serbs).

  The second thing that the disruption shows is that if someone can't convince others in such a reasonably informed audience as we are, he or she says that we should be sent to The Hague. What does that show of the "methodology" uses by the tribunal? And what is our "crime"? Seeing Milosevic's viewpoint (which the judges are supposed to do). On the other hand, the shots seems to be called by brazenly anti-Slavic racists (who of course deny they are racists, because the racists are those with the guts to stand up to them). Any SS officer (or at least a stereotype of an SS officer) would have been proud of such a peptalk. Any dissent is threatened, if only indirectly, with an assassination (I think the judges have sworn that they will not be intimidated in any circumstances). The people who believe such stuff are not necessarily stupid, they are just weak and they are cowards. Maybe they prefer the word "tolerant", which is a misnomer, if there ever was one. Another word that the lawyers want to use of themselves when they either swallow or spread such rubbish is "professional".
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 6:34 am
  By the way, why hasn't Milan Panic been shoved into a Black Maria and taken to the airport and flown to The Hague as a witness? He is better known for his televised anti-Milosevic comments than Lilic. And he wasn't even a head of state, "only" a prime minister. Isn't that because of his American citizenship, which makes him all of a sudden "uncontrollable"?
  
  J N
  Finland

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 6:58 am
  Indeed as Jari Nousiainen suggets, it is the SPS, the succesor of the Yugoslav Communist Party which has been all a long the problem for capitalism's expansion into Yugoslavia since the fall of the USSR and the ensuing fight between EU and US for her spoils in Eastern Europe.

  The meeting this weekend in Sarajevo of the presidents of Serbia, Croatia and (!) Bosnia-Hercegovina, together with the EU demand to keep the federation of Serbia-Montenegro as pre-condition to join the EU in contradiction to US policy, is clear evidence that the reconstruction of Yugoslavia (in its pre-ww2 incarnation) is in the making.

  This is the European plan, Europe seemingly ragaining the iniative in the Balkans while the US keeping the Middle East, hence the latest "crisis" in Turkey, under exclusive domain.

  Also, I noticed the latest comments by Richard Prosper (US ambassador on human rights) suggesting further trials to be conducted in Croatia or in Serbia and press editorials suggesting the "second" part of Mr. Milosevic trial shall be conducted in Serbia.
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 9:38 am
  Correction: Richard Prosper is the US embassador at large on crimes against human rights.
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 3:05 pm
  The AP reported a Bosnian Serb who was sentenced to life in prison for the killing of two Muslim brothers was released after the Muslim brothers showed up alive and well. The Serb had spent nine years in prison for this so called war crime. ////On Monday the Sarajevo court gave the Serb nine years for other war crimes and then released him stating he had already served the nine. (Pretty fast thinking.)///Many of the missing in Srebrenica who were reported murdered in a massacre by the Bosnian Serbs will probably show up one day after they believe the Serbs have been destroyed one way or another. Some of them have probably been killed in Afghanistan.
  
  Kathryn Love
  SJC
  USA

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 4:56 pm
  Theoretically, an American "glasnost" would not destroy our society, like the truth about Katyn and other Soviet crimes destroyed the Soviet regime.
  The difference is that an open, democratic society is strengthened by self-examination ... by Truth.
  Maybe I am naive. Maybe our leftist media and intelligentsia have so rotted our society through that it will collapse: we shall see.
  Nor should Europeans be eager to see us fall, whatever envy and resentment toward us you feel. Socially, culturally, ideologically we are much closer to you than the other superpowers. I cannot imagine Jari('s outspokenness) surviving more than his first Internet posting in a Russia- or China-dominated Europe.
  America (and Europe too) needs an ethical cleansing and Reconstitution, and if Kosovo can be a vehicle to these ends, it is a battle worth fighting. Democracy and freedom cannot survive without law and justice.
  
  Lou Coatney
  Macomb
  Illinois USA

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 6:09 pm
  It is good to see that there are so many out there that have spent the time to watch the trial on video and read the transcripts. The most striking thing to me has been the almost complete lack of evidence for the reasons given for NATO attacking Yugoslavia in 1999. Just where are the 100,000 dead civilians? Why was the KLA instructing civilians to leave Kosovo, and then telling the world that they were being forced out by Yugoslav forces? When the Ramboulliet "Accord" was being "negotiated", why weren't minor Yugoslav modifications considered. It would seem to me that the leader of the wrong nation is sitting in the defendant's chair.
  
  Adrian Justin
  Seattle
  WA

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 6:56 pm
  

  CASTING THE SERBS AS FASCISTS How did the Serbs come to be viewed as fascists in this conflict? This characterization has now become an accepted fact, an issue beyond debate. It makes U.S. motives seem unimpeachable and on the side of good against evil. In April 1993 Jacques Merlino, associate director of French TV 2, interviewed James HarW director of Ruder Finn Global Public Affairs, a Washington, D.C-based public relations firm. The interview shows the role of the corporate media in shaping a political issue. Harif bragged of his services to his clients—the Republic of Croatia, the Republic of Bosnia~Herzegovina and the Parliamentary opposition in Kosovo, an autonomous region of Serbia. Merlino described how Harif uses a file of several hundred journalists, politicians, representatives of humanitarian associations, and academics to create public opinion. Harif ex plained: "Speed is vital . . . it is the first assertion that really counts. All denials are entirely ineffective." In the interview Merlino asked Harif what his proudest public relations endeavor was. Harif responded: "To have managed to put Jewish opinion on our side. This was a sensitive matter, as the dossier was dangerous looked at from this angle. President Tudjman was very careless in his book, Wasteland of Historical Reality. Reading his writings one could accuse him of anti-Semitism [Tudjman claimed the Holocaust never happened-SF;] In Bosnia the situation was no better: President Izetbegovic strongly supported the creation of a fundamentalist Islamic state in his book, The Islamic Declaration. "Besides, the Croatian and Bosnian past was marked by real and cruel anti-Semitism. Tens of thousands of Jews perished in Croatian camps, so there was every reason for intellectuals and Jewish organizations to be hostile toward the Croats and the Bosnians. Our challenge was to reverse this attitude and we succeeded masterfully. "At the beginning of July 1992, New York Newsday came out with the article on Serb camps. We jumped at the opportunity immediately. We outwitted three big Jewish organizations-the B'nai B'rith Anti-Defamation League, The American Jewish Committee and the American Jewish Congress. In Aug ust, we suggested that they publish an advertisement in the New York Times and organize demonstrations outside the United Nations. "That was a tremendous coup. When the Jewish organi zations entered the game on the side of the [Muslim] Bosnians, we could promptly equate the Serbs with the Nazis in the public mind. Nobody understood what was happening in Yugoslavia. The great majority of Americans were probably asking them selves in which African country Bosnia was situated.

  I hope this can help.
  
  Gogol Charlemagne
  Conn. USA

• Tuesday July 16, 2002 at 7:33 pm
  Lou, I have not seen a single post on this web page where Jari advocates a form of Chinese or even present day Russian social order. What I see from Mr. Nousiainen, Mr. Taylor and many others is an intelligent analysis of current events where NATO has played a role. They ask questions and to me the questions are more important than the answers.### You claim that America is an open society which is being strengthened by self-examination. The self-examination that you wish for Lou versus what is represents two different realities. The reality for America is defined by those that own the media and you like me here in Canada only know events as they are depicted by the media###. Michael Parenti states “Even when we know the events are not as reported by the media the media continues to brainwash and their viewpoint is the only one that matters”. When is the last time you had any influence over what CNN broadcasts? On the other hand, CNN and other media outlets silenced all those that question American foreign policy in post Sep. 11th by wrapping the nation in the stars and stripes and no one dare say anything different if they wanted to hold onto their jobs.### You claim that American Media is leftist. What evidence do you have of this? As far as I can see, since we in Canada are influences by your media constantly, I find your media further right than that of the Nazis. The media does not criticize; it simply parrots the political line of the existing government. The Elian Gonzales case as an example represented the most despicable display of manipulation and jingoism. It was outright national child abuse.### Yes Lou, we are closer to the Judeo Christian values but that does not mean that we should not be able to question and suggest without fear in what direction our society is going. With apologies (for I know you are a well read person) I would like to suggest two books? These books will give you an immense amount of pleasure and information about America as seen by Americans. Michael Parenti’s book “Inventing Reality” provides evidence that American Media is to the right of Attila the Hun. My daughter who was taking a course in American history introduced me to a book by Howard Zinn, “The Real History of the United States”. This book is an eye opener and should be mandatory reading for every American student. I know that this will never happen because it poses too many questions which beg to be answered and most Americans would not like the answers. Lou “When is the last time Noam Chomsky appeared on CNN or any other so called democratic media? The media, seems to me is working overtime to hide the truth rather than expose the lies. Yes Lou, you are right freedom and justice are necessary for the survival of democracy but it can not be freedom and justice and the American Way out of the barrel of the stealth bomber.
  
  Walter Trkla
  Kamloops
  BC Canada

• Wednesday July 17, 2002 at 3:21 am
  We are conducting this conversation on an American website. This is what I meant when I said that this may be all that is left of the fairness of the trial. I think that should answer Lou's criticisms, if there were any. Try to find something similar in Europe. You don't have to bring in the Russians or the Chinese. Actually, I think that the Russian media is nowadays freer than our "Western" media.

  The problem with the conspiracy theories and the policies out of which they are woven have one problem in common: the belief that the Americans cannot screw up. Every little detail has a significance in the Americans' plans. Human beings don't work that way. They screw up, and the Americans do too. Just pointing out this simple fact about human behaviour doesn't mean that I want America to fall. Neither does it mean that America will stand forever. It was only in 1995 that the Americans were still afraid that the Japanese might take over the U.S. Even the collapse of the communist bloc didn't reassure them. The U.S. has thus been the world's only remaining superpower for about seven years, not more. It shouldn't think that it is now suddenly invincible.

  If I am now seen as part of some Sino-European conspiracy, that shows how "open" the American society really is. I thought it was obvious to everybody that I am not a "leftist", even if I don't think that the SPS leaders should be persecuted because of their political persuasion and for "putting Yugoslavia first".

  Not everybody who criticizes you is your enemy. Not knowing the difference between enemies and friends may actually be your biggest problem. The Muslim terrorists are not your friends, no matter how much you now try to woo them. I have even said that the ICC is a bad deal for America, but the American policy should be consistent.

  As to the suggestion that part 2 of the Milosevic trial should be held in Serbia, I think that would satisfy one basic requirement: even prisoners of war have to be returned home after the cessation of active hostilities, according to the Geneva Conventions. No matter what you think of Milosevic et al., it can't be doubted that they fought for their country. It ought to be an embarrassment to everybody to take them to another country, let alone keep them in a foreign prison for life. In their home country even their proper medical care could be better guaranteed. Among their own people they would get a more even-handed trial. I am just wondering whether the judges and the prosecution team would stay the same. At least Carla would show up less frequently. Also, the Western media would have a better excuse not to keep televising the trials. If Milosevic is kept in prison in Serbia, there seem to be some backdoors in the basic documents of the ICTY that would facilitate a solution acceptable to all after the sentence. But of course, the basic document can - and will - be amended. (At the present rate, the Rules of Procedure will be amended six times during the two years that the trial is expected to last.)

  There is one major concern in taking the trial to Serbia, from the Serbian point of view. The comparison has been made with the Nuremberg trials, which were held in Germany. After the trial, the prisoners served their time at Spandau in Berlin. This seems a more humane way of dealing. The difference is that Germany was at that time occupied. Does taking the trial to Serbia mean that the Serbian sovereignty will be compromised even more than it has been already?

  There are political problems as well. The Kosovars wouldn't be too happy about it. Maybe the Bosnians and Croats would, after they get their own citizens back and the relations between the three Souther Slav states have been improved. But maybe Kosovo doesn't matter any more. Maybe it was no coincidence that the UN ombudsman slashed the UNMIK human rights record at this crucial time. That would be an exit strategy for the Americans, who still want to be seen as the champions for human rights. Building bridges with Serbia, on the other hand, would also empower the Serbs to take part in the war on terror and make it a valuable partner.

  The problem, from the American point of view, may be that the "democratization" of Serbia isn't yet solid enough to resist the pull of Milosevic, who would now be in Serbia. But then again, who would the socialists fight after the Americans gave them back their leader? The only enemy that would be left are the terrorists.
  
  Jari Nousiainen
  Finland